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;■"'     1 S  'i-H E  UAIU)  THAT  RU LE^'  W. E  VA)RLD" 


THE  LIBRARIES 


Bequest  of 

Frederic  Bancroft 

1860-1945 


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EngV  Geo,  EPerme.Nwrtovi^ 


TTME  Rfl®Tri}{ll£U^  ®[F  JE^ 


After  Papha'^!^'  '-"Riminc  in  iTip,  Dresden  Gallery 


THE    MOTHERS 


or 


GREAT    MEN    AND    WOMEN, 


AND 


SOME  WIVES  OF  (iUEAT  MEN. 


BY 

LAURA   C.    HOLLOWAY, 

AVTHOR  OP 

'Thb  Ladies  of  the  White  House,  '  "As  Horn  with  Charlotte  Bromte," 

KTC.   ETC. 


ILLUSTRATED. 


BALTI^EORE : 
R.  H.  WOODWARD  &  COMPANY. 

1892 

>  »     *  ■ 

I  ^       »   i        •        .        »  ,5  *       *      '  »       ' 

I         '*>>!  >J  >  l>>         )> 


V 


j^^^(iC- 


Copyrighted 
By  LAURA  C.  HOLI/)WAY, 


<   •         c»     .       ■      * 


«  t     »      *• « 


X    •  »       «  A 


TO    THE    MEMORY 

OP    HER 

WHO     GAVE     ME     THE     PRICELESS     GIF! 

OF  A 

Potlier's  gone 

THIS    BOOK 

IS 

TiEDICATED. 


'  All  true  trophies  of  the  cges 

Are  from  tnotlier-love  innenrled  ; 
For  the  hand  that  rocks  vfie  ci-udle 
Is  the  hand  thav  i-ules  the  world.' 


PREFACE. 


It  must  not  be  supposed  that  in  selecting  the 
mothers  of  great  men  for  a  subject,  the  writer  imag- 
ines that  all  great  men  had  great  mothers,  or  that  the 
same  continuity  of  qualities  are  to  be  looked  for  in 
human  families  as  in  the  lineage  of  the  race-horse. 
As  a  rule,  however,  it  has  been  generally  conceded  by 
physiologists  that  the  mother  has  most  to  do  with  the 
characteristics  of  the  child,  and  that  the  fountain  of 
his  earliest  physical  nutriment  is  also  the  chief  source 

••4 

of  his  mental  and  moral  attributes.  There  is  usually 
to  be  found  in  the  characters  of « the  mothers  of  great 
men  innate  strength  and  a  good  development  of  mind, 
even  if  they  are  not  what  may  be  termed  highly  edu- 
cated. And  they  are  nearly  always  women  of  good 
physical  development  as  well.  They  cared  for  their 
bodies  as  well  as  their  minds,  and  gave  life  to  children 
who  in  after  years  rose  up  and  called  them  blessed. 

The  influence  of  the  mother  has  been  proclaimed  by 
all  races  of  men  in  all  ages.  The  Red  Cross  Knights 
who  sauntered  to  "  Sainte  Terre,"  and  when  they 
reached  the  Holy  Land  fought  for  the  Holy  Sepulchre, 
were  inspired  to  their  pilgrimages  by  zealous  mothers 
and  wives.  The  deeds  of  heroism  in  every  age  have 
been  the  indirect,  if  not  the  direct,  work  of  women, 
and  most  frequently  of  mothers. 


PREFACE. 

We  need  not  travel  back  to  antiquity  to  find  illustra- 
tions of  this  truth  ;  the  women  of  this  age  are  living- 
evidences  of  the  source  from  whence  their  sons  have 
derived  their  gifts  of  mind  and  health.  Every  de^Dart- 
ment  of  human  energy  and  excellence  in  modern  times 
in  all  countries  furnishes  abundant  examples  of  the 
truth  that  whatever  the  mother  is  that  will  the  son 
be  also. 

In  this  volume  of  'pen  portraits  of  the  mothers  of 
great  men,  the  silent  influence  of  mothers,  themselves 
in  many  instances  unknown  to  fame,  has  been  traced 
upon  their  sons,  and  in  several  cases  ui)on  their 
daughters.  The  marks  of  jjliysical  and  intellectual 
lineage  have  been  emphasized  and  the  personal  influ- 
ence of  mothers  over  the  career  of  sons  like  them  has 
been  eagerly  proven.  The  difficulty  of  explaining 
how  men  of  genius  are  indebted  to  mothers  whose  at- 
tainments in  no  wise  compared  to  their  sons  is  granted, 
but  the  writer  assumes  that  while  genius  escapes  all 
formulas,  the  physiological  and  mental  aptitude  of 
the  man  of  genius  is  inherited,  and  in  the  majority  of 
cases  directly,  from  the  mother.  The  spiritual  side  of  a 
man's  character  is  likewise  largely  transmitted  by  the 
mother,  while  to  the  mother's  training  is  due  the 
moral  development  and  the  aspiration  and  hope  of  a 
higher  life  i)resent  in  men. 

There  is  no  love  like  a  mother's  love,  and  love  being 
the  highest  and  most  potential  of  human  qualities,  it 
may  be  concluded,  very  naturally,  that  the  intensity 
of  affection  bestowed  by  a  mother  of  character  upon 
her  son  marks  him  as  hers  through  life. 

The  difficulty  in  the  way  of  establishing  clear  testi- 


PKEFACE. 

mony  of  the  pre-eminent  power  of  the  mother  in  the 
development  of  the  child  is  due  to  social  conditions, 
which  have  operated  adversely  for  them.  It  is  an  al- 
most insurmountable  obstacle  to  the  right  presenta- 
tion of  the  mother's  influence  in  the  world.  Ignorant 
prejudice  has  set  such  limitations  about  women  and 
hedged  them  in  with  so  much  that  is  false  in  theory 
and  in  fact,  that  the  history  of  the  mothers,  even  of  the 
greatest  men,  is  not  easy  to  obtain.  The  exceptions 
are  noted,  but  the  lives  of  the  generality  of  women  are 
not  deemed  important  enough  to  trace,  even  in  the  his- 
tories of  their  distinguished  sons.  Particularly  is  this 
true  of  American  women  who  have  been  well  nigh 
ignored  by  historians. 

If  this  work  succeeds  in  awakening  a  new  interest  in 
the  subject,  and  arouses  in  the  sex  a  desire  to  know 
more  of  the  great  even  if  obscure  mothers  of  men  and 
women  of  light  and  power  in  the  world,  it  will  have 
fulfilled  a  w^orthy  mission,  and  performed  a  good 
work. 


List    of   Subjects. 


PAGE 

Mary,  thk  Mother  of  Washington 25 

The  Mother  of  Mendelssohn 48 

Letitia,  the  Mother  of  Napoleon 69 

Monica,  the  Mother  of  St.  Augustine 91 

The  Mother  of  Lincoln Ill 

The  Mother  of  Dickens 129 

The  Mother  of  the  Wesleys 146 

The  Mother  of  Charles  Lamb 169 

The  Mother  of  Thackeray 174 

Cornelia,  the  Mother  of  the  Gracchi 177 

The  Mother  of  Byron 194 

The  Mother  of  Rev.  John  Newton 215 

The  Mother  of  Martin  Luther 221 

The  Mother  of  Stonewall  Jackson 241 

The  Mother  of  Cowper 259 

The  Mother  of  Goethe 266 

Lady  Lennox,  the  Mother  of  the  Napiers 284 

The  Mother  of  Richter 304 


LIST   OF    SUBJECTS. 

PAGE 

ilADAME   NeOKER,    THE   MOTHER   OF   MaDAME   DE    StAEL 309 

The  Mother  of  Shakspeare 329 

The  Mother  of  Beethoven 341 

The  Mother  of  Sheridan 360 

The  Mother  of  Anthony  Trollope 375 

Lady  Beaconspield,  the  Wipe  of  Disraeli,  Premier  of 
England 383 

The  Mother  of  Garfield 398 

The  Mother  of  Humboldt 411 

Lady  Russell 420 

Lamartine 436 

Milton's  Wives 457 

Carlyle's  Mother 479 

The  Mother  and  the  Wife  of  Samuel  Johnson 507 

Mothers  of  Antiquity 535 

Marie  Antoinette 546 

The  Mother  of  Burns 581 

Short  Sketches  op  some  Wives  and  Mothers  :  The  Moth- 
ers OF  LucRETiA  Mott.  Gambetta,  George  Sand,  George 
Eltot,  Kant,  Cromwell,  Christina  op  Sweden,  etc 597 

Abigail  Adams 635 


List   of    iLLrsTRATiois^s. 


PAGE 

IVIaey  and  the  Child   Jesus Frontispiece. 

{From  Raphael's  Painting  in  the  Dresden  Gallery.) 

Leah  Mendelssohn-Baktholdy 49 

The  Mother  of  Napoleon fi8 

St.  Augustine  and  his   Mother 101 

The  Mother  of  President   Lincoln 119 

Susannah  Wesley  and  her  Children,  John,  Charles,  and  Others.  153 

Cornelia,  the  ^Iother  of  the  Gracchi 187 

Luther  at  Home 235 

Goethe'  s  Mother , 269 

Goethe'  s  Mother  Telling  Stories  to  her  Children 287 

{See  jKifje  366.) 

Suzanne  Necker,  the  Mother  of  Madame  de  Stael 321 

Marie  Antoinette 371 

{See  page  546.) 

The  Mother  of  President  Garfield 405 

9 

SLiDAME  Russell 423 

The  Mother  of  Lamaetine 441 

Marie  Antoinette  and  her  Children 555 

The  Mother  of  John  Q.  Adams ,  .  637 


Table  of  Contents. 


Maey  Washington 25 

The  mother  of  Washington — Why  she  is  not  better  known  — 
Separated  from  her  son  in  his  later  years — Few  particulars  known 
of  her  daily  life — No  letters  of  hers  preserved — An  interested 
observer  of  public  affairs— A  woman  of  strong  character — A  i^ ray- 
ing woman  her  constant  companion — De  Tocqueville's  definition 
— A  silent,  serious  woman — Forty-six  years  of  widowhood — 
A  good  mother  and  able  business  woman — Lacking  in  personal 
ambition— Not  popularly  known  to  the  public — Only  one  public 
appearance  at  a  grand  ball  with  her  son — His  beautiful  devotion 
to  her — Mother  and  son  much  alike — Both  wanting  in  humor — 
An  instance  of  her  courage — How  she  prolonged  her  life— Wash- 
ington persuades  her  to  live  in  the  city — Her  personal  supervision 
of  her  farm — Out-of-door  life  — Her  quiet  composiire — A  great 
woman— A  consistent  Christian — Not  a  colorless  character — A 
descendant  of  the  Covenanters — The  children  of  the  early  settlers 
— Trained  to  religious  habits— Mary  Ball's  parents — Her  home — 
Marriage  —  Augustine  Washington — A  stepmother  —  Her  new 
home — Birth  of  a  son — The  ancestry  of  Mary  Washington — Her 
son  like  her  in  character — A  descendant  of  the  Covenanters — As 
a  wife  and  mother — A  religious  household — How  she  instructed 
her  children  in  obedience— Mr.  Washington's  death  —His  will — 
Mrs.  Washington's  position — What  a  kinsman  said  of  her — Mr. 
Sparks's  opinion  of  her — George  Washington  Parke  Custis's 
glowing  tribute  to  her  —  George  a  schoolboy  —  Holidays  at 
Mount  Vernon — His  desire  to  go  to  sea  —  Objections  of  his 
mother — A  neighbor' s  efforts  —Mistaken  in  his  estimate  of  her 
— Some  facts  regarding  this  plan  to  make  George  a  naval  officer 
— His  mother  thanked  for  her  wise  course — Her  manual  on 
morals  preserved  by  her  son — Permits  him  to  become  a  militia 
officer — Life  at  Mount  Vernon — No  more  with  her — The  Revo- 
lutionary war  begun — He  visits  her  before  going  away—  A  long 
separation— The  reunion  after  Cornwallis  surrendered — a  mes- 
sage from  Washington — His  presence  in  Fredericksburg — After 


11  TABLE   OF   CONTENTS. 

six  years  of  separation — Attends  a  ball  at  seventy  j-ears  of  age — 
A  happy  son  and  a  proud  mother — American  and  European 
officers  presented  to  her — Her  appearance— A  visit  from  Lafay- 
ette—  At  work  in  her  garden — Washington  again  at  Mount 
Vernon — Urges  his  mother  to  live  with  him — Her  second  refusal 
— Declines  to  live  with  her  daughter — Washington's  frequent 
visits  to  her — Her  daily  habit — Strengthening  hei-self  by  prayer  — 
Quiets  her  children's  alarm — Washington  elected  President — 
His  farewell  visit  to  his  mother — A  painfial  parting — Her  death 
shortly  afterward — Mrs.  Lewis  writes  her  brother  -  His  letter  in 
reply  -Her  will — Corner-stone  of  a  monument — Andrew  Jack- 
son's eulogy — The  monument — Graceful  poetical  tribute. 


Mother  of  Mendelssohn 48 

Her  family — Felix,  the  happy  one — "Midsummer  Night's 
Dream" — The  father  of  Felix — His  sister  Henrietta — A  bright 
Avomau — Letter  from  Leah  Solomon — Abraham  Mendelssohn's 
wife— Their  home  in  Hamburg — Their  children — Mendelssohn 
Bartholdj' — Letter  from  Abraham  to  Fannj' — Noble  Hebrew  par- 
ents— Character  of  Fanny — Happy  family  life — A  fond  mother 
— Her  death — Her  grandson's  description  of  her. 


The  Mother  or  Napoleon 69 

Born  at  Ajaccio  in  1750 — Married  at  the  age  of  sixteen — Her 
beauty  remarkable  in  childhood — Retained  it  until  the  end  of 
her  life — Her  son  like  her  in  mental  and  physical  qualities — Some 
leading  characteristics — The  description  of  her  by  the  Duchess 
dAbrantes— Napoleon's  tribute  to  her — Left  a  widow  in  depen- 
dent circumstances — "  Where  look  for  her  equal" — The  mater- 
nal heroism  of  Letitia  Bonaparte — Piecalling  the  days  of  her  youth 
— Describes  the  circumstances  under  which  Napoleon  was  born 
— Many  misfortunes  experienced  previously — A  time  of  war  and 
want  in  Corsica — The  mother  of  thirteen  children — A  widow  at 
thirty-five —The  French  governor  her  husband's  friend  and  pro- 
tector—  Scandal  concerning  her  and  the  Count  de  Marbceiif — A 
vile  slander — The  birth  and  childhood  of  Napoleon — His  master- 
principle  through  life — Early 'exhibition  of  it — Compared  with 
Achilles — The  tapestrj'  covering  depicting  the  heroes  of  Homer's 
Iliad — A  second  Charlemagne — Eighty-five  millions  of  people 
under  his  dominion — Sir  Walter  Scott's  description  of  the  sum- 
mer home  8f.  Madaiue  Bonaparte — A  lovely  retreat — A  hurried 
departure     from    it — Death    of     Napoleon's     father — Madame 


TABLE   OF   CONTENTS.  ill 

Bonaparte's  house  pillaged — Her  three  sous  banished — Sails  with 
them  for  Italj' — Settles  at  Nice — Kemoval  to  Marseilles— Severe 
privations  suffered  there— Six  years  of  exile  and  poverty — Kais- 
ed  from  privation  by  her  son's  successes — Napoleon's  attachment 
to  his  mother — Assigns  a  portion  of  his  gains  to  her — The  Revo- 
lution of  1799— llemoval  to  Paris — Receives  the  title  of  Madame 
Mere,  an  income  of  a  million  francs,  and  made  Protectrice 
Generale — Napoleon's  remark  concerning  her — A  resolute  spirit 
and  great  pride — Rebukes  her  son — Never  forgot  the  past — Par- 
simonous  in  habit — How  she  appeared  to  the  Duchess  d' Abrantes 
— At  the  house  of  Joseph — Devoted  to  the  interests  of  her  children 
— Her  efforts  for  Lucien — Accused  bj'  the  Emi^eror  of  favoritism 
— Her  noble  reply — Her  prudence  and  foresight — Efforts  to  save 
the  Duke  d'Enghien — On  her  knees  in  his  behalf— Dissatished 
"with  her  son — Admonishes  him  for  his  ill-treatment  of  the  Pope 
■ — Her  prophetic  warning  to  her  brother — Her  alarms  for  the  whole 
family — Provided  for  liberally — The  ladies  of  her  household 
■ — Marriage  to  Josephine — His  mother  takes  rank  next  after  her  — 
Her  dress  at  the  grand  fete — Napoleon's  three  love  affairs— Offers 
himself  to  Madame  de  Permon— His  remarkable  proposition  — 
Who  was  Madame  de  Permon — Her  children — A  widow  of  forty- 
six,  Napoleon  twenty-six — Her  refusal  of  Napoleon — The  widow 
first  annoyed  and  then  amused — •"  Old  enough  to  be  your  mother" 
—They  quarrel — Napoleon  an  exile — His  mother  and  sister  with 
him — Cheering  him  to  hope  on — Her  letters  to  him  at  St.  Helena 
— Her  desire  to  join  him — Sends  a  physician  and  confessor  to  him 
—His  long  and  painful  illness — Cancer  of  the  stomach — His  men- 
tion of  his  mother  in  his  will — The  return  of  the  physician  sent 
by  Madame  Mere — His  interview  with  her — Obliged  to  tell  but 
little  of  her  son's  last  days — Her  great  emotion — An  afflicted 
mother — "A  most  heart-rending  spectacle" — A  proof  of  her 
gratitude — Gives  a  diamond  to  the  physician — The  phrenologi- 
cal characteristics  of  Napoleon — Like  his  mother  in  features  and 
mental  qualities — Force  of  will  a  predominating  quality  in  each 
— Her  residence  in  Rome- -Offers  to  give  all  she  has  to  him — His 
appreciation  of  her  character — His  many  tributes  to  her — Las' 
Casas  reports  his  condition  at  St.  Helena— Her  fortune  at  her 
son's  disposal  -Affecting  appeal  to  the  allied  sovereigns — "lam 
a  mother' — Her  noble  conduct— Her  treatment  of  her  daughters- 
in-law — Reserved  toward  both — Empress  Maria  Louisa's  conduct 
toward  her —She  goes  to  dine  with  Madame  Mere — Empress 
Josephine  less  attentive— Ill-advised  conduct — Death  of  Madame 
Mere  at  Rome — Her  character  influenced  by  outward  circum- 
stances — The  charge  of  miserliness  imtrue — A  dread  of  poverty 
—  '•The  rainy  days"  of  her  life— Napoleon's  estimate  of  her  im- 
partial—Alone  and  unaided,  she  supported  eight  children— Had 


IV  TABLE   OF   CONTENTS. 

he  heeded  her  advice  —Overleaping  ambition-  Her  maternal  in- 
stinct greater  than  his  judgment — The  evening  of  her  last  days. 


Monica,  the  Mothee  of  St.  Augustine 91 

An  example  to  Christian  mothers — Her  name  famous  through 
her  son's  greatness — Impossible  to  separate  the  two — St.  Augus- 
tine's influence  over  Western  civilization  in  Western  Europe — 
His  writings  the  noblest  classics  of  the  Christian  Church — The 
dissensions  of  Christians  in  the  fourth  century — Monica's  son 
stayed  the  relapse  into  Paganism — The  chief  characteristics  of 
his  mother  and  himself  found  in  his  writings — His  father  Patri- 
cius — A  heathen  freeman — Monica  marries  at  her  father's  com- 
mand— Born  in  332 — A  Catholic  by  training — A  Pagan  husband 
and  a  Christian  wife — A  mother-in-law  who  was  not  a  saint — 
How  the  two  lived  together — What  her  son  said  of  his  mother's 
disposition — Death  of  his  father — The  son  at  college  at  his 
mother's  expense — Monica's  husband  converted  before  he  dies 
— A  man  of  violent  temper — He  mocked  at  her  standard  of  ex- 
cellence— Her  son's  sensuality — The  father  of  an  illegitimate 
child — Patricius's  scorn  of  his  wife's  morality — His  son  '•  only 
sowing  wild  oats" — St.  Augustine's  description  of  his  son — The 
youth's  early  death — His  love  of  Monica — The  mother  of  this 
child — Enters  a  convent  after  St.  Augustine's  conversion — 
Monica's  efforts  in  her  son's  behalf — Baptized  at  Milan— Before 
the  change — Monica's  belief  in  dreams— One  of  her  remark- 
able dreams — "Through  long  years  of  waiting" —Augustine's 
friend  Nebridius  —  His  death — Augustine  inconsolable — He 
writes  a  book  and  returns  to  Milan  from  Kome — A  teacher  of 
rhetoric — At  the  age  of  thirty — He  writes  despondently  to  his 
mother — Her  long  journey  from  Tagaste  to  Carthage,  and  thence 
to  Rome — A  storm  at  sea — Her  great  calmness — She  cheers  the 
sailors — Arrives  at  Civita  Vecchia— Disappointment  awaits  her 
in  Rome — Her  son  at  Milan — A  long  journey  over  the  mountains  • 
— Two  hundred  leagues  to  be  traversed  bj-  the  wearj^  woman — 
The  desire  of  her  soul  was  to  save  her  son — Converted  under  the 
teachings  of  St.  Ambrose,  Bishop  of  Milan — A  great  convert — 
Next  to  St.  Paul  in  intellect— He  stayed  scepticism  in  the 
Church — His  great  talents  were  given  to  the  service  of  God — 
Deeper  grew  his  thoughts  and  wiser — His  definition  of  time — 
The  anguish  of  a  repentant  soul — "The  angel  who  wrestled  in 
praj'er  for  him" — Her  tears  watered  the  ground  in  every  place 
— Her  gratitude  over  his  conversion — After  seventeen  years  of 
waiting  and  praying — A  friend  from  Africa  -An  incident  related 
by  him — A  religious  revival  extending  into  Africa — St.  Augus- 


TABLE   OF-  CONTENTS. 

tine  profoundly  impressed — Abruptly  leaves  the  house — He 
weeps  in  the  garden  and  hears  an  angel's  voice— Account  of  his 
conversion — The  now  happy  mother  and  her  transformed  son — 
Their  conversations  together — A  great  painter's  picture  of  the 
two — They  talk  of  eternity — Monica  declares  her  time  come — 
The  desire  of  her  heart  gratified — "What  do  I  hear?" — The 
shadows  of  evening  closing  in — Illness  of  Monica — Tells  her  son 
to  bury  her  where  she  dies — Lament  of  a  friend  that  she  was 
dj'ing  so  far  from  her  old  home  in  Africa — "  Nothing  is  far  to 
God  " — Matthew  Arnold's  poem — Her  son's  last  duties — He 
buries  her  body,  and  is  alone  — "It  is  to  my  mother  that  I  owe 
everything" — He  thanks  God  for  such  a  mother — A  model 
Christian  mother  and  wife — She  gained  her  husband  and  saved 
her  son  from  unbelief  and  sensuality — Her  saintship  m  the 
Catholic  Church. 


Abraham  Limcoln's  Mothep.   .■ Ill 

Her  mental  condition — His  birthright  of  sorrow  and  depres- 
sion— Mothers  physiologically  considered — Mr.  James  Mills's 
views — When  character  is  formed —  "  Mothers'  marks"  — The  feel- 
ings of  James  the  First — Whatever  the  mother  is,  that  her  child 
is — The  undertone  of  soitow  in  Lincoln's  nature— His  mother's 
health — A  disappointed  and  overworked  wife — His  father — Lin- 
coln's reserve — A  supposed  mystery — The  cause  of  his  sorrow — 
The  charge  of  illegitimacj'' — The  impress  of  disappointment — 
Nancy  Hanks — A  well-endowed  woman — Her  rare  intuitive  fac- 
ulty— What  was  said  of  her — Lincoln's  inheritance  from  his 
father — His  story-telling  proiDensity — The  one  excitement  of 
Thomas  Lincoln's  life — A  poor  mechanic — Proof  of  the  marriage 
of  Lincoln's  laarents — The  bond  given  by  Lincoln — The  marriage 
— What  Mr.  Graham  says  of  Mrs.  Lincoln— Abraham's  birth — The 
ancestry  of  his  parents — The  character  of  his  father — Dickens's 
and  Lincoln's  childhood  compared — '■'•  The  long,  long  rainy  day 
of  poverty"— Mother  and  son— Teaching  her  child  to  read— The 
encouragement  she  gave — Mrs.  Lincoln's  morbid  fear — A  prod- 
igy of  learning — A  proud,  reserved  woman — Her  personal 
appearence— Death  of  Mi-s.  Lincoln— Her  little  boy— Last 
thoughts — A  neglected  child — His  one  pleasure — A  touching 
tribute— Asks  a  minister  to  preach  her  funeral — Filial  conduct — 
A  year  of  loneliness — A  step-mother — Abe's  welcome  to  her— A 
kind  woman — Changes  in  a  Western  cabin — An  energetic  worker 
— A  disappointed  wife — Her  love  for  her  step- son — What  she 
said  of  him — Her  children — Abe  leaves  home — His  earnings 
given  to  his  step-mother — A  wanderer  henceforth — Death  of  his 
father — Kind  interest  in  ilrs.  Lincoln — Visits  her — His  last  part- 


Vi  TABLE   OF   CONTENTS. 

ing  with  her— Her  fears  regarding  him — His  assurance  to  her- 
A  dutiful  son— Like  his  own  mother— The  fame  that  is  hers. 


Chables  Dickens'  s  Mother 129 

Early  life  of  her  son — Not  a  happy  one — His  father's  employ- 
ment— Marriage  of  John  Dickens  and  Elizabeth  Barrow — The 
parents  of  eight  children — "Charles  John  Huffman" — Early 
recollections — "  David  Copperfield"  a  true  biography — The  home 
at  Portsea — Some  early  memories — Impressions  of  Chatham — 
Types  of  character  in  "David  Copperfield" — Gadshill  place — 
Childish  ambition  to  possess  it — "  The  verj-  queer  small  boy"  — 
What  he  said— Dickens's  descriiDtion  of  himself —Earliest  passion 
for  reading  awakened  by  his  mother — Taught  him  the  alphabet — 
What  his  father  did  to  aid  him— The  little  room  up-stairs — The 
books  he  read— VivicL  imagination— Personating  characters  in 
"Tom- Jones"  and  other  books — A  picture  from  memoiy— 
Dickens  leaves  the  school  at  Chatham—  An  apprentice  to  poverty 
and  neglect — Micawber's  character — Mrs.  Micawber  a  counter- 
feit presentment  of  his  mother — What  Dickens  said  of  his 
father — Utterly  indifferent  to  his  son's  claim  upon  him — De- 
generating into  a  bootblack,  chore-boy,  and  drudge — His  mother 
tries  an  exiDeriment — "  She  must  do  something" — Mrs.  Dickens's 
establishment— No  pupils— The  father  arrested  for  debt — The 
child's  visits  to  his  father — Advice  of  the  latter  to  the  Jad — 
At  work  in  a  blacking  warehouse—"  Cast  awaj'  at  such  an  age" 
— A  sensitive  and  suffering  child  —His  mother  and  her  children 
join  his  father  in  prison— Charles  left  to  work— Dismissed  from 
the  warehouse— His  mother  tries  to  send  him  back — "I  never 
shall  forget,  I  never  can  forget" —Bitterness  toward  his  mother 
— She  fails  to  appreciate  him — Buys  a  home  for  his  parents — 
His  description  of  it— Her  death — No  great  love  for  her— The 
hardness  of  his  early  life  attribiited  to  her--A  plea  for  her — The 
trials  of  poverty  and  shiftlessness— A  father  with  many  faults — 
His  mother  really  serving  him — Lacking  in  insight — A  child's 
yearning  for  sympathy — Her  thoughts  of  daily  bread— Mothers 
unjustly  condemned — Mrs.  Dickens  a  household  drudge — As 
good  a  mother  as  she  knew  how  to  be  —Her  burdens  heavy  to 
bear. 


The  Mother  of  Wesley 146 

A  fine  study — Characteristics  of  her  son — Never  idle — The  Fran- 
cis Xavier  of  the  Protestant  Church — Belief  in  the  supernatural — 
Proof  of  his  greatness— The  Methodist  Church — Its  tremendous 


TABLE   OF   CONTENTS.  vii 

influence — "What  Wesley  would  not  have  encouraged — Work  and 
prayer — The  source  from  whence  his  principles  came — Letters  of 
his  mother — Her  character — The  mother  of  the  Israel  he  founded 
— Her  ability— A  well  trained  mind — What  Adam  Clarke  said  of 
her — Who  she  was — The  child  of  a  Nonconformist — A  letter  ex- 
plaining her  views — An  independent  spirit — Two  differences  she 
had  with  her  husband — A  Jacobite  in  politics — She  did  not  say 
Amen — Questioned  by  her  husband — Her  reply — His  rage — A 
hasty  vow — Leaves  his  wife — Gone  a  year — The  death  of  King 
William — Nineteen  children — Her  child  John — Another  instance 
of  her  independence— The  forerunner  of  Methodism — Mr.  Wesley 

—  His  wife's  prayer-meetings — Eeligious  conversation — Family 
service — A  regular  gathering — An  angry  curate — His  letter  to  Mr. 
Wesley — The  conventicle  at  the  parsonage — A  word  of  terror — 
Why  Wesley  objected — "Because  of  her  sex" — A  brave  woman 

—  "  If  I  am  unfaithful" — Wesley's  second  letter — His  wife's  de- 
fence— The  meetings  at  her  house — Her  refusal  to  obey — The 
final  result  of  the  matter —Susannah  Wesley  as  a  mother — Early 
marriage  and  many  children— The  eldest  son — A  distinguished 
man — The  other  children — A  precocious  child — Teacher  and 
mothei' — The  care  of  thirteen  children — Business  manager — 
Mr.  Wesley  in  prison  for  debt — The  secret  of  Mrs.  Wesley's 
method — A  place  for  everything — Home  discipline — A  strict 
family  government — The  mistake  of  severity — Set  opinions — 
Mrs.  W^esley's  great  prescription — Her  definition  of  self-will — 
TJie  parent  who  does  the  devil's  work — Her  system  successful — 
John  Wesley  a  noble  vindication  of  it — What  Dr.  Johnson  said 
of  it— Some  observations  of  Mrs.  Wesley's — The  will  of  children 
— A  summaiy  of  her  rules — "To  cry  softly  if  at  all" — Wesley's 
commendation  of  his  mother — The  Wesley  children — No  eating 
between  meals — No  rudeness  tolerated — Long  hours — Eeligious 
instruction — The  departure  of  Wesley  for  school — The  fire  at 
the  rectory — His  mother  wading  through  the  fire — John  missing 
— The  rescue — How  accomplished — Another  alarming  visitation — 
Unaccountable  disturbances — Some  spiritvialistic  phenomena — A 
terrified  maid-servant — Strange  knockings — The  father  not  in- 
formed— Loud  rumblings  heard — Footsteps  on  the  stairs — 
Ghostly  visitors — Wesley  annoyed — Nine  distinct  raps — Search- 
ing the  house — A  dog  that  showed  terror — Its  nervous  distress 
— Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge's  explanation— Mrs.  Wesley's  opinion 
of  the  noises — "  Try  the  spirits" — Deep  groans  heard.  Asking 
questions — Father,  mother,  and  sister  reassured — The  welcome  to 
the  spirits — Invited  to  the  rector's  study — An  offended  spirit 
— The  daughter  treated  to  a  physical  manifestation— Familiar 
spirits  around — Explanations  proffered — ^Hiat  Isaac  Taylor, 
Priestley,  and   Southey  said — John   Wesley's  opinions— Super- 


Vlll  TABLE   OF   CONTENTS. 

natural  origin — An  apparition  seen— ilr.  Bamesley's  mother's 
ghost — John  Wesley  a  spiritualist — Strange  occurrences  at  Ep- 
worth — New  Testament  confirmation — Mrs.  Wesley's  -wisdom — 
Her  letter  to  her  son — No  sense  in  the  phenomena — Her  letter 
to  John — Good  advice — Adam  Clarke  s  judgment  ot  Mrs.  "Wes- 
ley—Her wise  instruction— A  iaithtul  mother — Doubting  herself 
—  "One  thing  troubles  me" — Constantly  praying— Discontent — 
Change  of  heart  at  seventy — John  "Wesley  preaching — His 
mother's  approval — Her  eldest  son's  opposition — "A  spreading 
delusion" — Asks  her  not  to  join  a  schism — Her  discipleshiiJ— 
The  epitaph  upon  her  tombstone. 


Chaeles  Lamb's  Mother 169 

How  chiefly  remembered — Humble  parentage — Charles  and 
Marj'  Lamb — The  difterence  between  mother  and  daughter— An 
inharmonious  family— Mary  a  milliner — Overworked  and  insane 
— Kills  her  mother— Mary's  pathetic  words. 


Thackeray's  Mother 174 

His  parentage — A  second  marriage — A  strong  churchwoman 
— Thackeray's  stepfather — Unfortunate  marriage  of  Thackeray 
— Home  broken  up— His  daughter — An  insane  wife. 


Cornelia,  the  Mother  of  the  Gracchi 177 

As  daughter  and  wife — Remains  a  widow— Where  are  your 
jewels? — Her  sons — Both  murdered— The  father  of  Cornelia— 
The  capture  ot  New  Carthage — Ambitious  designs — The  battle 
of  Zama — Eetiirn  home — His  death — Cornelia  his  youngest 
child — Plutarch's  opinion— Cornelia  s  husband  Tiberius — His 
death — A  noble  Roman  mother — Her  sons  land  reformers— En- 
couraged by  their  mother— The  epistles  of  Cornelia— Her  retire- 
ment at  Misenum. 


Lord  Byron's  JIother. 194 

Unfortunate  in  temperament — Both  parents  irrational—  "  Mad 
Jack  BjTon"— "  Foul-Weather  Jack"  in  the  navy — Bj'rons 
great -uncle— "The  wicked  lord  "—"  The  little  boy  in  Aber- 
deen"— Lord  Bj-ron's  beauty — The  Marchioness  Carmarthen— 
A  beautiful  woman — Augusta  Byron — The  adventurous  life- 
guardsman — Catharine  Gordon — A  plain-looking  heiress— Mar- 


TABLE   OF   CONTENTS.  ix 

riage  of  "Mad  Jack"  and  Catharine —Her  father  a  suicide— The 
bridal  ]3air  in  Paris— Her  fortune— T\yo  years  afterward — The 
husband's  creditors — A  vagabond  husband — The  milk  of  human 
kindness  soured — A  temper  passionate  and  a  heart  deceived — 
Half  mad — Bj^-on's  mother  not  the  fury  represented — Touches 
of  motherhood — Trials  and  vicissitudes — The  pen  of  Thackeray 
needed— Wife  and  children  penniless — A  begging  letter — "  Only 
a  guinea" — "Mad  Jack's"  sister— A  wife  with  nothing — AVine 
and  meat,  how  bought— The  greatest  of  all  his  dupes — Plain  leg 
of  mutton — An  ungoverned  temper — Living  at  Aberdeen — The 
cai^tain  resolves  to  leave  — "Not  a  jsenny" — The  son's  feeling 
toward  the  father— Perhaps  one  reason — The  little  lame  boy — 
Unforgotten    caresses — His    father's   escape — Death   at   Valen- 
ciennes— The  statement  of  Mr.  Harness— What  Bj'ron  said — 
Believing  his  father  a  suicide — One  who  mourned  his  death — 
Grief  of  a  hot-tempered  wife — The  neighborhood  alarmed — The 
wonderment  of  a  child  of  three  years — The  result  of  a  French 
education — Paris  a  paradise  for  "Mad  Jack" — Contrast  between 
iis  first  and  second  wives — Lady  Conger's  income — The  second 
wife's  homeliness — How  she  looked  and  walked — Inferior  edu- 
cation— Her  broad  brogue— A  discredit  to  a  waiting-woman — 
Her  letter-writing — Shrewd,  and  by  nature  intelligent — In  her 
fits    of    fury  —  Her   qualities   as   a   stepmother  —  Kindness  to 
Augusta — The  child's  gratitude — Byron's  half-sister — Cruel  and 
most  unnatural  episode — Swearing  at  her  son — "A  lame  brat" 
— The  taunt  of  a  demoniacal  mother — Byron's  statement  to  the 
Marquis   of   Sligo — She  herself   to  blame  for  his  deformity — 
Their  last  parting — Her  imprecation— Byron's  look — A  fearful 
light   from    a  child's    eyes — Self-controlled — "I   was   born   so, 
mother!" — A  terrible    scene,    never   forgotten — A   dialogue   in 
"The  Deformed  Transformed" — Excuses  for  the  mother — The 
Earl  of  Carlisle's  experiences — Byron  at  school — Dulwich  days — 
Collisions  between  his  teacher  and  his  mother — Dr.  Glennie's 
pen-portrait  of  Mrs.  Byron — His  guardian's  efforts — Beaten  by 
the  virago — "Your  mother  is  a  fool!" — The  BjTon  family — No 
intercourse  with  Catharine  Gordon — Mrs.  Leigh's  course — Not 
informed  of  her  son's  succession  to  the  peerage — News  a  month 
old— The  gossip  of  a  neighbor — Lively  astonishment — A  better 
.state  of  things — Five  years  later — Catharine  Gordon's  pension 
— Lord  Bj'ron  at  Harrow — Renewal  of  hostilities — Incidents  of 
their  quarrels— The  strife  of  tongues — Mrs.  Byron's  com^jlaints 
of  being   ill-used — Her  son's  fears — An  aiJothecary's   singular 
visit  from  mother  and  son — Their  neighbors — The  Pigotts — An 
unexpected  visit — Off  to  London— The  last  meeting  between 
mother  and  son— An  attack  with  the  jDoker- Byron  at  Newstead 
Abbey — A  luxurious  bachelor— His  mother  not  allowed  to  come 


X  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 

there — Her  presence  there  afterward — Learns  of  her  death — 
Byron's  recall —  "  Only  one  mother  !" — A  right  feeling — Bj'ron's 
grief — Her  death  due  to  rage — In  the  chamber  of  death  at  mid- 
night—  "One  friend  in  the  world" — His  vehement  grief  ac- 
coTinted  for — Memorj^  sensibility,  and  imagination — His  motlier 
not  destitute  of  womanliness — Kemote  exhibitions  of  tenderness 
— Not  insincere  in  his  sorrow — The  death  of  a  parent — A 
mother's  curse — Byron's  remorse — The  dreadful  past — His  grief 
oi  short  duration — Refusal  to  follow  her  coffin — Boxing  with  a 
servant  while  the  funeral  service  was  being  read — Moore's 
defence  of  his  conduct  —  "He  felt  her  death  acutely" — His 
mother's  jaride  in  him— Her  faith  in  his  literary  fame — A  col- 
umn of  notices— The  final  judgment  of  this  unhappy  mother. 


The  Mother  of  Kev.  John  Newton 215 

Who  was  he? — An  emanciiDator  who  freed  himself — Author 
of  favorite  hymns — Joint  author  with  Cowi^er — Letters  of  Cow- 
per  and  Mrs.  Unwin — Where  Cowper  met  him — Curate  of  Olney 
—Rector — Author  of  theological  works — His  autobiography — 
Painful  excesses  in  youth — A  sailor  and  pirate — An  African 
slave-trader — A  motherless  boy — His  remembrance  .ot  her — 
Taught  him  the  Scriptures — His  inheritance  from  her — Her 
influence  over  him — Her  heart's  desire— Had  she  lived— An 
encouragement  for  pious  parents  —  Earlj'-  imijressions  —  The 
child  of  many  prayers — Studying  Latin  at  six  years — Death  of 
his  mother — His  father  remarries — A  cabin-boy  at  ten — Years 
of  profligacy  —  Bondage  in  Africa  —  Rescue  —  Conversion  —  A 
religious  man — Great  will-power — Release  from  sins— Deeply 
respected  in  England — His  hymns  sung  upon  every  sea — Saved 
by  his  mother's  prayers  and  memory. 


The  Mothee  of  Maetin  Luthee 221 

Four  hundred  years  ago — Margaret  Lindemann — A  peasant's 
daughter — Married  to  Hans  Luther — Her  son's  birth — The  angel 
of  the  churches  of  the  Reformation — St.  Martin's  Eve  —Named 
after  a  saint — Luther's  mother  a  servant — Mai-ried  to  a  miner — 
Seven  children — The  marriages  of  the  daughters— The  arms  of 
Luther's  father — Martin  proud  of  his  parents— A  good  father — 
His  common-sense — What  he  would  not  do— A  disappointed 
priest — His  first  duty  to  his  children — Carrying  fagots— Hard- 
working people — Severe  punishments  and  little  tenderness — 
Luther's  fear  of  his  father— Training  of  German  children  four 
hundred  years  ago— Whipped  until  the  blood  flowed — Flogged 


TABLE   OF   CONTENTS.  xi 

fifteen  times  in  one  day — Sad  reminiscences — Removal  from 
Eisleben — What  Martin  said  of  his  parents— Position  of  the 
mother  in  Germany — Power  of  the  husband — Blows  and  the 
rod — A  Saxon  wife  in  those  days — A  Jewish  domestic  system — 
A  departed  custom — Modern  methods  of  rearing  children — Lu- 
ther's parents  generous  in  educating — What  Andin  says  of 
Hans  Luther — Labor  and  jarayer — How  the  Luthers  spent  their 
evenings — Hans  Luther  j)raying  at  the  bedside  of  his  child — 
Luther  and  Melanchthon — Hard-earned  money  s^Dent  on  Luther — 
John  Luther  a  public  official — Open  house  to  the  ecclesiastics — 
Great  questions  discussed — Sixteenth  century  movements — Mar- 
tin sent  to  school — Remarkable  abilities — Begging  alms — Spare 
hours  spent  in  singing  from  door  to  door — A  peasant's  kindness 
— The  children  afraid — "Where  are  j'ou,  boys?" — Fright  over- 
come—A  friend  in  need — Martin  sent  to  another  school — Obliged 
to  sing  in  the  streets  for  his  daily  bread — Martin' s  estimate  of 
his  mother — One  day's  occurrences — Disheartened  and  weary — 
Hungrj'  and  alone — A  door  opens — The  wife  of  Conrad  Cotta — 
"  The  pious'Shunammite" — Invited  to  share  their  home — Martin 
Luther  happy — A  second  mother — Learns  to  play  the  flute — A 
poetic  nature — His  three  loves — An  incident  of  his  life  as  a 
monk — His  love  for  children — A  boy's  pillory — -Words  of  wisdom 
— Shudders  to  think  what  he  went  through — Piecalls  his  mother's 
severity — His  love  for  her — Thinks  of  her  as  he  walks  toward 
Kome^ — "  Happy  the  mother,"  etc. — His  desire  to  give  her  hap- 
piness— What  his  father  designed  him  to  be — Ties  of  blood 
strong — His  father  angry — Blames  him  for  disobedience — Deep 
anxiety  of  his  mother — Her  long  useful  life — Death  of  her 
husband — Last  years  —  Death  —  Charles  the  Fifth's  saying — 
Luther  before  the  Diet  of  Worms — A  notable  spectacle— The 
trial— "In  the  hands  of  Almighty  God  " — Luther's  fame — His 
marriage — Fine  saying — Could  but  the  peasant  mother  know 
of  the  high  festival  for  her  son. 


The  Mothek  of  SioNEWAiiL  Jackson 241 

The  South  and  its  environments — The  father  of  Thomas  Jack- 
son— His  marriage — An  improvident  man — The  gambling  habit 
— Death  of  Jonathan  Jackson — A  destitute  family — Mrs.  Jackson 
— Her  personal  character — Endui-es  great  poverty — Second  mar- 
riage—Separation from  her  children — A  painful  picture — Death 
of  the  mother — Her  life  of  prayer  and  faith — Her  son  like  her — A 
false  doctrine — Her  children  separated — The  eldest  son— Thomas 
leaves  his  home — His  long  walk — With  his  brother — Both  wan- 
derers— Great  sufferings— Return  to  Virginia— Death  of  Warren 


XI 1  TABLE   OF   CONTENTS. 

— Thomas  at  "West  Point — A  noble  youth — His  early  resolve — 
Jackson  in  the  Mexican  Army — The  only  falsehood  he  ever  told— 
Established  at  Lexington — Professor  in  the  university — Marriage 
— Death  of  his  wife — Visit  to  his  mother's  grave — Second  mar- 
riage— The  Civil  War — Career  as  a  soldier — An  ideal  military 
hero — The  night  before  the  battle  of  Manassas — Guarding  his 
sleeping  soldiers— How  he  got  his  title  "  Stonewall" — A  notable 
letter — Jackson's  daughter — His  death -bed — Dying  experiences 
— Last  words. 


The  Mothee  of  Cowpeb 259 

A  sensitive  child — A  great  misfortune — A  motherless  boy — A 
loving  memory — His  poem  to  his  mother — Letter  to  Mrs.  King 
— A  picture  of  his  mother — Cowjier's  love  for  Mrs.  Unwin — 
Her  tender  care  of  him — Kecollections  of  his  mother — "Every- 
body loved  her" — Maternal  kindnesses — "  O  that  those  lips  had 
language" — Her  monument,  and  its  inscription — From  whom 
he  inherited  nervous  trouble — A  tendency  to  brafin  trouble — 
Anne  Donne-  -His  ancestry — A  weak  body  and  a  diseased  mind. 


The  Mother  or  Goethe 266 

Her  marriage — Her  son — Not  a  woman  of  genius — An  incen- 
tive to  her  son — Mr.  Lewes' s  judgment  of  her — Relations  between 
the  mother  and  son — Her  forte  at  story-telling — The  grandmoth- 
er— An  imaginative  narrator  and  listener — The  mother's  own 
words — Her  friends — Letters  to  the  Grand  Duchess — From 
Aya's — An  anecdote  of  mother  and  son — Goethe's  sensibility — 
A  sunny  nature  and  lovable  woman — Saturday  evening  amuse- 
ments—The shadows  of  old  age — Her  love  for  her  son — Her 
death. 


The  Mother  of  the  Napiers 284 

Lady  Sarah  Lennox — The  daughter  of  the  second  Duke  ot 
Richmond — Her  parents — Their  singular  marriage- A  bargain 
to  cancel  a  gambling  debt — A  boy  brought  from  college  and  a 
girl  from  the  nursery — The  exclamation  of  the  bridegroom — A 
wedding  and  a  parting — Three  years  afterward — Sees  his  bride 
at  the  theatre — Their  meeting  and  union — A  loving  couple — His 
death — She  dies  of  grief  for  him — Their  daughter's  remarkable 
beauty — An  inheritance  from  her  mother  —Lady  Lennox  at  St. 
James's — George  the  Third's  admiration  of  her — The  greatest 
beauty  at  the  celebration  of  the  first  anniversary  of  his  accession  to 


TABLE   OF   CONTENTS.  xiii 

the  throne— "What  Horace  Walpole  said  of  her— The  young  king 
desperately  in  love  with  her— Encouraged  by  Henry  Fox  to  re- 
ciprocate the  king's  feelings— She  loved  another— Dazzled  for 
the   moment   at  the   possibility  of  being  Queen  of  England  — 
The   king   subdued    his   love— Various   reasons   assigned— Her 
lover— Lord  Newbottle— A  separation— The  king's  mother  op- 
poses his  fancy— His  love  messages  to  Lady  Sarah— How  Sarah 
went  dressed  to  speak  with  him — A  picture  of  Lady  Sarah  as  a 
shepherdess— Her  life  at  Holland  House— An  era  of  remarkably 
beautiful  women— The  two  Miss  Gunnings— Duchess  of  Hamil- 
ton and  Lady  Coventry— Sir  Joshua  Reynolds's  portrait  of  Lady 
Sarah— Her  sister  the  wife  of  the  first  Lord  Holland— A  girl  of 
seventeen  when  she  met  the  king— A  young  man  of  twenty-one — 
His  council  voted  against  the  marriage— Lady  Sarah  a  bridesmaid 
to  his  queen — An  incident  at  the  drawing-room  next  day — Lady 
Sarah  mistaken  for  the  queen— The  king  never  forgot  the  impres- 
sion made  upon  him — His  exclamation  years  after,  when  seeing  an 
actress  who  looked  like  her — Forgetting  for  a  moment  his  pru- 
dish wife  beside  him— The  pedigree  of  Lady  Sarah— The  ancient 
family  of  "The  Lennox"— She  had  royal  blood  in  her  veins— A 
descendant  of  Henry  of  Navarre  and  Charles  the  Second— Her 
vivacity  and  sprightliness  due  to  her  French  blood— Also  her 
moral  weakness  and  love  of  admiration— A  sad  story— Marriage  to 
Sir  Thomas  Charles  Bunbury— The  marriage  subsequently  dis- 
solved by  the  House  of  Lords— No  divorce  courts  in  England  in 
1776 — The  wife's   errors  proven— Her   reputation  assailed— An 
infamous    writer — The    "memoirs'"    of   a    French    duke — The 
beauties  of  the  reign  of  George  the  Third — The  two  Irish  beau- 
ties—Their romantic  marriages — Horace  "^^alpole  s  description 
of  them — The  crowd  clamorous  to  see  these  women — Mobs  wait 
at  their  doors  to  catch  sight  of  them — Their  appearance  any- 
where a  signal  for  a  crowd — Seven  hundred  people  sit  up  all 
night  to  see  one  of  them— The  eldest  Duchess  of  Hamilton  after- 
ward the  Duchess  of  Argyle^-Lady  Coventry's  sad  fate— A  victim 
to  her  vanity — Lady  Sarah  Lennox  an  intellectual  woman — Her 
appearance  in  some  private  theatricals— Compared  to  the  Mag- 
dalen of   Correggio— Married   at   eighteen— Her  husband  a  re- 
markable man— What  his  wife  said  of  his  gambling— Her  letters 
to  Mr.  Selwyn — Accounts  of  persons  about  her — Eefers  to  the 
Frenchman  who  blasted  her  reputation— Thackeray's  allusions 
to  him  in  the  "  The  Virginians"— Itejoices  that  Jie  died  on  the 
guillotine — Sarah  Lennox  a  childless  wife — Her  life  as  a  divorced 
woman — Meets  the  Hon.    George  Napier— Becomes  his  wife — 
Fifty  years  a  happy  wife— The  mother  of  noble  sons— The  great- 
est of  her  children— His  love  for  his  mother — Many  allusions  to 
her  in  his  diary — His  military  career — Much  like  her  m  features 


XIV  TABLE   OF   CONTENTS. 

— Her  total  blindness  in  later  life — Her  sons  engaged  in  various 
battles — The  blind  mother  in  England  weeping  for  them — Her 
death  at  an  advanced  age — The  last  great-granddaughter  of 
Charles  the  Second. 


Jean  Paul  Eichteb's  Mothek 304 

The  influence  of  a  good  mother — Jean  Paul  Richter's  mother 
and  himself — His  tender  letters^His  noble  words,  "All  women 
are  sacred  for  her  sake" — A  domestic  man — A  poor  country 
parson's  son — A  pastoral  picture — His  father's  study — The 
evening  meal — Good  Pastor  Eichter — A  widowed  mother  and 
a  fatherless  boy — Spinning  to  relieve  i)overty — Her  wish  regard- 
ing her  son— At  the  University  of  Leipsic — The  motive  that 
impelled  him — To  sweeten  his  mother's  life — "  Were  it  not  for 
my  mother" — Becoming  iin  author— Her  anxious  question — 
His  reply — His  first  money — Takes  it  home  to  his  mother — Late 
at  night  he  finds  her  spinning — A  golden  treasure  in  her  lap — 
A  mother  tenderly  beloved -A  true  mother — An  illustrious  .son. 


Madame  Neckee,  the  Mother  of  Madame  de  Stael 309 

Her  birthplace — A  clergyman's  daughter — A  Swiss  village 
parsonage — Where  baptized — Her  beautiful  mother — Beaiity  her 
inheritance — A  remarkable  woman — The  excitement  her  arrival 
caused  m  Lausanne  —  Suzanne's  acqiiirements — Borrowing 
books  from  the  professors — What  one  of  her  instructors  wrote 
her— The  attractions  of  the  parsonage  for  young  preachers — 
The  congregation  not  aware  of  the  reason  why  thej'  were  priv- 
ileged to  hear  so  many  young  preachers — Two  young  divines 
bind  themselves  in  writing  to  preach  at  Grassy,  whenever  the 
beautiful  girl  should  command — Their  sweetest  pleasure — 
Pastor  Curchod  lends  his  horse  to  his  young  assistant — Why 
they  must  come  back  again— The  young  girl's  friendly  adviser 
— "Drive  them  away  with  a  broomstick" — The  most  note- 
worthy episode  of  her  unmarried  life — Edward  Gibbon,  the 
historian — His  infatuation — A  youth  of  twenty,  and  a  maiden 
of  seventeen — Young  love's  dream — An  engagement — Opinions 
of  Eousseau  and  others— A  stern  father— English  view  of  filial 
obedience— Gibbon  and  Mile.  Curchod— The  engagement  broken 
— What  Gibbon  says  of  her — His  glowing  tribute  to  her  in  old 
age — After  long  separation  and  many  vicissitudes— Letters  of 
hers   to   him— Return    to    England — "I    sighed   as   a   lover,    I 


TABLE   OF   CONTEXTS.  XV 

obeyed  as  a  son" — Wholly  dependent  on  his  father — His  cure 
effected — The  Seven  Years'  War — A  statement  of  his  conduct 
from  Gibbon — Explanation  of  his  feelings — Her  father  and  her 
mother — The  daughter  of  the  minister  of  Grassy — The  erudition 
of  Mle.  Curchod — Her  fine  manners  and  pure  nature — A  dream 
of  felicity — Gibbon  destitute  and  helpless — Her  father  dies — 
Teaching  school  and  supporting  her  mother — Meets  M.  Necker 
— The  wealthy  Paris  banlcer  her  suitor — Thi'ough  vicissitudes  a 
lovely  and  spotless  woman — Thackeray's  remarks — Her  love  for 
Gibbon — One  letter  of  hers — Love-letters  a  hundred  and  thirty 
years  old — The  Neckers  leave  Paris — Meeting  with  Gibbon — 
Living  at  Coppet — Frequent  letters  to  him  — "You  have  always 
been  dear  to  me" — Calls  herself  Gibbon  s  first  and  last  friend — 
His  meeting  with  Madame  de  Stael — The  latter's  innocent  design 
— A  brilliant  woman,  and  a  great  favorite  with  literary  men — 
Madame  Necker 's  admirei's — Her  dejected  suitors — Married  to  a 
man  who  has  35,000  francs  a  j'ear — The  elderly  bridegroom — 
What  he  said  of  his  money  and  his  marriage — The  home  of  the 
Neckers  in  Paris — French  society  in  the  eighteenth  century — 
Madame  Neckers  flatterers — A  fearful  male  egotist — Her  Friday 
evening  receptions — Distinguished  guests — A  famous  dinner- 
party— Freethinkers — Her  religious  opinions — A  letter  from 
Grimm — At  Catharine's  court — The  Eussian  Empress — An  en- 
thusiast's praise — Her  systems  and  reforms — Compared  with 
Necker — Diderot — His  gossip  about  Madame  Necker — A  coarse- 
minded  man— Her  friendships — Voltaire — D'Alembert — Courted 
by  the  encyclopaedists  —  Her  letter  regarding  her  religious 
sentiments — "  I  have  Atheist  friends — They  are  so  unhap^jy" — 
Buffon's  death-bed  —A  confession  from  his  lips — A  friendship  of 
twenty  years— Her  friendships  with  women — Her  public  life — 
A  noble  woman — A  dissolute  age — Less  brilliant  but  more  sin- 
cere than  Madame  de  Stael — Her  perpetual  hopefulness. 


The  Mothee  and  Wife  of  Shakspeare 329 

Mary  Arden  a  woman  of  gentle  birth — Her  eldest  son — The 
condition  of  England  at  the  time  of  Shakspeare's  death— John 
and  Mary  Shakspeare — Their  son  religiously  instructed— Learns 
the  Bible  at  his  mother's  knee— Proofs  of  such  teachings— Almost 
literal  gospel  quotations— ■'=  The  eye  of  a  needle"— Shakspeare 
a  Christian— What  scholars  have  said  of  him— Little  knowledge 
of  his  personal  history— Early  marriage — Anne  Hathaway— 
Shakspeare  in  London— Poor  in  purse— Death  of  his  only 
son— Shakspeare's  domestic  life— A  god-father— Tender  mem- 
ories. 


xvi  TABLE   OF   CONTEXTS. 


The  Mothek  of  Beethoven 341 

A  sad  lot  -  Beethoven's  afllictions—  His  art  an  inspiration — A 
composer  at  an  early  age — Music  a  divine  gift — Plato's  definition 
of  the  soul — Music  a  medicine  and  the  most  humanizing  of  all 
recreations— The  language  of  music— An  hereditary  gift  to 
Beethoven— The  family  lineage— Beethoven's  grandfather— A 
court  musician — His  mother  a  cook's  daughter— Beethoven's 
birth-place — The  baptismal  register — Death  of  his  grandfather— 
ApoDTilar  man  in  Bonn — Beethoven's  grandmother— His  fathers 
unfortunate  inheritance — A  fine  tenor  voice — The  habits  of  a 
drunkard— Profligacy  and  poverty— Paints  his  father's  portrait— 
Ludwig's  lessons— Little  Louis  at  the  piano — Symjiathy  of  his 
playmates  for  him — At  the  age  of  four — A  letter  to  his  brothers — 
His  sufferings  in  childhood  described — Attacked  with  deaf- 
ness— Thoughts  of  suicide — Makes  his  brothers  his  heirs — Longs 
for  death — His  nephew  Carl — His  mother — A  letter  to  Dr.  Wege- 
ler — An  accusation — Not  the  natural  son  of  the  King — Vindi- 
cates his  mother's  memory — Allusions  to  his  mother — Poor  in 
health  and  purse — A  kind  friend — The  support  of  his  younger 
brothers —Teaches  miasic — A  musical  author  at  eleven — His  first 
public  notice— Herr  Neefe's  pupil — A  pupil  of  Mozart — The 
latter's  prophecy  regarding  him — Beethoven's  affectionate  dispo- 
sition— His  recollections  of  his  mother — His  first  and  onlj'  love — 
His  sweet  memories. 


The  Mother  of  Sheridan 360 

Born  in  L.-eland — How  she  won  her  husband — Writes  a  pam- 
phlet in  his  favor — The  author  of  a  two-volume  romance  at 
fifteen — Afterward  adapted  to  the  stage — Her  eldest  daughter 
— Another  novel — Its  success — Opinion  of  the  London  Monthly 
Review — Dr.  Johnson's  compliment — Lord  North  and  Charles 
James  Fox  commend  it  —  Her  son's  plot  for  "School  for 
Scandal"  borrowed  from  it — Mrs.  Sheridan  writes  a  success- 
ful comedy — Garrick  in  the  principal  character — His  opinion 
of  "The  Discovery,"  another  comedy — "The  Dupe"  —  A 
romance  of  the  East — ' '  Her  best  work" — Dramatized  after  her 
death — Mrs.  Sheridan's  "Trip  to  Bath" — The  basis  of  her  son's 
comedy,  "The  Rivals" — Her  fxigitive  verses— Leigh  Hunt's 
adverse  opinion  of  them — Thomas  Sheridan  receives  a  pension 
— Dr.  Johnson's  ill-natured  remark— Moore's  neglect  to  give 
facts  of  one  of  the  most  remarkable  of  families — Great  hered- 
itary genius — Stint  praise  of  Sheridan's  mother — "A  woman 
indebted  for  a  husband  to  her  literature" — The  Sheridans  a 


TABLE   OF    CONTENTS.  xvii 

rare  family — Distinguished  in  authorship  for  300  years — Donald 
O'Sheridan's  ancestors — A  daughter  of  one  of  the  O'Niells — 
Sarah  Sheridan's  grandson — The  first  author  of  the  family — 
Translates  the  Bible  into  the  Irish  tongue — Denis  Sheridan's 
Irish  Bible — The  sons  of  Biblical  Denis — The  Sheridan  home- 
stead— Dean  Swift's  epigrammatic  attacks  upon  this  farmhouse 
— His  happiest  days  spent  there — Thomas  Sheridan,  the  father 
of  Kichard  Brinsley,  an  actor — Romantic  marriage  to  Miss  Cham- 
berlayne — Subsequently  he  lectured  on  elocution  and  the  dra- 
matic art,  adapted  old  plays  for  the  stage,  and  edited  the  life 
and  works  of  Swift,  in  nineteen  volumes — Author  of  a  pronounc- 
ing dictionary — His'  son,  Eichard  Brinsley,  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury  —  Another  son,  Secretary  of  War  in  Ireland  —  His 
daughter  a  writer — The  author  of  the  "ilemoirs  of  Frances 
Sheridan"  her  grandmother — Lord  Duiferin  a  descendant  of 
Frances  Sheridan ;  likewise  the  Duchess  of  Somerset — The 
story  of  the  acquaintanceship  of  Sheridan' s  mother  and  father 
• — Kelly's  riot — A  paper  war — An  anonj-mous  letter  and  verses 
— Miss  Chamberlayne  introduced  to  Thomas  Sheridan — The 
theatre  closed — Generous  condiict  of  Thomas  Sheridan — Wed- 
ding— A  happy  couple — The  cares  of  a  rising  family — Her  chil- 
dren— Eeverses — The  wife's  brilliant  talents — Her  novel,  "Sid- 
nej'  Biddulph" — A  faithful  picture  of  middle  life  in  the  eigh- 
teenth century — Her  husband  not  informed  of  her  work  until 
the  novel  was  completed — How  she  wrote — Hiding  her  manu- 
script on  his  entrance — Dr.  Johnson  snubs  her — Her  little 
daughter — Travels  with  her  husband — Removal  to  France — A 
consumptive — Death  of  Mrs.  Sheridan — Her  burial  in  a  Protes- 
tant cemetery — Personal  appearance — A  highly  intellectual  and 
lovely  woman. 


Frances  Teollope 375 

The  mother  of  Anthony  Trollope,  the  great  novelist,  and 
of  Thomas  AdolphiTs  Trollope,  the  well-known  authori— Both 
brothers  inherited  their  literary  gift  from  her — A  woman  of 
great  ability  and  incessant  activity — Mrs.  TroUope's  unfortunate 
book — Her  "Domestic  Life  of  the  Americans"  an  unpopular 
production — The  writer  of  many  books — When  she  began  to 
write — Her  numerous  literary  progeny — Satire  her  chief  weapon 
— Two  works  on  America  in  two  years — Two  on  Italy  the  next 
year — Politics  a  favorite  study — A  compromising  Tory — Some 
of  her  studies  overdone — Her  aim  to  bring  about  social  reforms 
by  means  of  satire — "  The  Widow  Barnaby" — The  humor  of  this 
story — A  great  success — Her  supplemental  novel,  "  The  Widow 
Married"  —  Other    novels  —  An   active-minded   and   observant 


XVIU  TABLE   OF   CONTENTS. 

writer — Not  a  great  one — Too  much  gall  in  her  criticisms  of 
society — A  "widely-read  novelist — Not  a  jDrofound  analyzer  of 
character — Is  not  the  equal  of  her  son  as  a  -s^-riter — The  stock 
characters  of  both — A  social  satirist  who  did  much  good — Pene- 
tration and  fearlessness  her  leading  attributes — Her  literary 
broom — Reasons  why  she  is  unpojjular  in  this  country — Super- 
ficial judgment  of  Americans — Her  abhorrence  cf  slaverj' — Her 
observations  on  the  "Help"  question — What  she  endured  with 
inefficient  help — A  difficult  problem — The  prejudice  still  abroad 
— Contemi^t  for  domestic  service — Her  ijictures  of  revivals  and 
camp-meetings — A  satire  upon  a  revivalist's  personal  char- 
acteristics and  sermon— The  position  of  women  as  she  found 
them  —  A  sevenfold  shield  of  habitual  insignificance  —  Fifty 
years  ago — IVIi's.  Trollope's  looking-glass. 


*o*^ 


Lady  Beaconsfeeld 387 

The  wife  of  Benjamin  Disraeli — Some  facts  regarding  him — 
Literary  tastes  of  Disraeli — His  parents — The  Jews  in  England — 
Sarah  Villaval — A  stern,  strong  woman — Disraeli's  father  runs 
awaj"-  from  home — Changes  his  name — Mr.  Disraeli's  colleague 
Mr.  Lewis — His  appearance  in  the  House  of  Commons — ''  Iioillsit 
downnow" — Married  to  Miss  Lewis — Becomes  master  of  Hughen- 
den  Manor — Description  of  the  place — A  column  to  the  memory 
of  Isaac  Disraeli — Lady  Beaconsfield — A  remarkable  woman — 
Great  devotion  to  her  husband — Disraeli's  novel  dedicated  to 
her — "  That  gracious  lady" — The  Queen  offers  him  a  coronet — 
Asks  the  honor  be  transferred  to  his  wife — Viscountess  Beacons- 
field — Lord  Eonald  Gower's  reminiscences — Lady  Beaconsfield 
at  home — Her  death — A  simple  funeral  -Disraeli  an  earl — 
Death  of  Earl  Beaconsfield — Buried  beside  his  wife. 


The  Mother  or  Garfield 398 

A  hard-working  widow — In  the  wilderness — A  dark  outlook — 
Advised  to  sell  her  home — Her  children — The  eldest  son's  prom- 
ise— A  hungry  family  —Working  in  the  field — A  devout  Christian 
— A  pioneer  reformer — Her  brave  boys— Mrs.  Garfield's  ancestry- 
Ten  generations  of  preachers — Abram  Garfield  a  strong  man — His 
sons  like  him — The  Sabbath  day — Gives  land  for  a  school-house — 
Her  eldest  son  a  wood-chopper — James  earns  a  dollar — His  pros 
perous  career— President  of  the  United  States — Inauguration 
day — "He  kissed  his  mother" — Mother  Garfield  at  the  White 
House — Returns  to  Ohio — The  assassination— "  Her  baby" — The 


TABLE    OF   CONTENTS.  xix 

nation  sorrows — Courageous    and    strong — Beside   the  coffin  of 
her  son — A  blighted  old  age. 


The  Motheb  of  Axexandee  von.  HmcBOLDT 411 

Two  famoiis  sons — The  father  an  army  officer — Marie  Eliza- 
beth von  Colomb — Marriage  of  Major  Humboldt  and  Mrs. 
Colomb — The  character  of  the  husband — Resigned  from  the 
army — Frederick  the  Great  his  friend — The  English  ambassador's 
opinion — Death  of  Major  Humboldt — His  wife — Widow  of  the 
director  of  the  East  Friesland  Chamber — A  wealthy  woman 
— Home  in  Berlin — Birth  of  her  sons — Alexander's  birthday — 
His  contemporaries — Baptized  by  the  king's  chaplain — His 
kingly  sponsors — His  mother's  name  that  of  Christopher  Colum- 
bus— What  Alexander  was  styled — His  mother's  ancestrj' — Her 
administrative  talent — Extensive  knowledge  of  the  world — Her 
endeavors  for  a  stepson  —The  education  of  her  young  sons — Her 
ambition  for  them — Mortgages  property  to  meet  the  expenses  of 
their  education — Secures  able  teachers — Her  country  mansion  at 
Tegel — A  beautiful  country  home — Goethe  a  welcome  guest — The 
mother's  influence  over  her  sons  indirect,  not  personal — How 
she  laid  the  foundation  of  their  greatness — One  of  their  tutors — 
Neither  of  the  sons  remarkable  boys — Alexander  compared  to  Al- 
bertus  Magnus — William  von  Humboldt's  description  of  their 
school-days — University  life  at  Gottingen — Friendship  with 
Kunth — Fifty  years  a  friend— Gratitude  of  Frau  Humboldt — Its 
practical  demonstration— Herr  Kunth  receives  a  pension — A  mem- 
ber of  Frau  von  Humboldt's  household — Buried  in  the  Von  Hum- 
boldt family  vault— Money  set  apart  by  Frau  von  Humboldt — 
■Generous  bequests — The  endowment  still  in  existence — Death  of 
Frau  von  Humboldt — Eeference  of  Alexander  to  the  event — Not 
deeply  wounded  by  the  event — Strangers  too  long — Her  great 
service  to  her  sons — She  gave  them  their  splendid  educations — 
The  gulf  between  mother  and  sons— Her  sacrifice  their  gain. 


The  Wife  of  Loed  William  Eussell 420 

A  high-minded  woman — Her  second  mai-riage — Older  than  her 
husband— Her  father — Her  favorite  residence — Affection  of  hus- 
band and  wife — Their  children — Lord  Eussell's  position — Hated 
by  the  Stuarts— His  arrest— Trial — His  wife  his  secretaiy— A 
terrible  ordeal— Heroism  of  Lady  Eussell — Her  entreaties— The 
last  leavetaking— The  pathos  of  it — Bishop  Burnet's  account  of 
it— Lord  Eussell  beheaded— His  wife's  agony— Political  detrac- 


XX  TABLE   OF   CONTENTS. 

tions — Lady  Kussell  writes  to  the  king — Vindicates  her  hus- 
band— Her  later  years — Her  children  restored  to  their  rights — 
Her  daughters — Seventy-five  years  of  age — Her  death. 


The  Mothee  of  Lamartine 436 

Alice  de  Eoy — Her  diary — Produces  twenty  volumes — Her 
studies — Born  at  St.  Cloud— Louis  Phillippe  her  plaj^mate — 
Eecollections  of  St.  Cloud — Her  marriage — In  a  convent — Her 
aunt  a  canoness— Origin  of  the  French  Revolution— A  reign  of 
terror — Arrest  of  M.  Lamartine — Fortunate  in  his  prison — His 
visits  to  his  wife  — Eeleased — A  countrj^  house  at  Milly — Descrip- 
tion of  it  -  The  husband  and  wife — Their  children — What  her  son 
says  of  her — A  religious  devotee — How  the  mother  wrote  of  the 
son — Her  beautiful  life — What  the  grandmother  of  Lamartine 
said  of  Eousseau — A  terrible  anecdote — An  anniversary — Pope 
Pius  the  Seventh — Death  of  Madame  Lamartine — Her  son  absent 
at  the  time. 


Milton'  s  Wives 457 

Description  of  Milton's  personal  appearance — His  riiling  pas- 
sion— Marriage — His  bride — Miss  Powell's  dowry — Wedded 
misery— A  disappointed  wife — Departs — Platonic  friendships — 
Eeturn  of  Mrs.  Milton — Her  family  bankrupt — Milton' s  generos- 
ity— The  father  of  Milton — His  mother — Milton's  second  wife — 
Poetical  allusion  to  her  death — His  blindness — Pathetic  account 
of  it — Sonnets  on  his  misfortune — Milton's  daughters —His 
third  wife — A  good  choice — A  lonely  old  age — The  great  fire 
in  London — His  house  burned — Teaching  his  daughters — What 
he  said  of  them — His  death — His  family  extinct. 


The  Mothee  of  Caeltle 479 

"The  best  of  all  mothers"— The  father  of  Carlyle— Their 
family  life— The  Mainhill  farm — The  mother  of  eight  children — 
A  devoted  household — Mrs.  Carlyle' s  religion — Mother  and  son 
— A  strong  tie — Her  anxiety  for  him — The  most  gifted  of  her 
children — His  frequent  letters  to  her — Sends  her  his  Life  of 
Schiller — Miss  Welsh — Carlyle's  future  wife — Visits  his  family — 
Account  of  the  visit — What  Froude  said  of  it — A  pitiful  tragedy 
— Carlyle's  conduct  toward  Mrs.  Welsh — Settled  in  Edinburgh — 
The  home  at  Comely  Bank — Character  of  Jane  Welsh  Carlyle — 
The  Craigenputtock  i)lan — Removal  there— Visit  of  Mrs.  Carlyle 


TABLE   OF   CONTENTS.  xxi 

to  her  son — Jane  Carlyle's  condition — "  Gey  ill  to  live  -with" — 
Margaret  Carlyle— Carlyle's  birthday —Letter  to  his  mother — 
Leaves  Craigenputtock — "Burn  their  ships  behind  them" — A 
discouraged  woman — Carlyle  settles  in  London— The  Cheyne 
Kow  home — Mrs.  Carlyle  to  her  mother-in-law — The  "  Life  of 
Cromwell" — "Starry  flashes  she  had  not" — Death  of  the 
mother — Her  son's  description  of  her — His  wife — Her  illness — 
Her  characteristics — Her  friends — Carlyle's  injiastice^The  re- 
sult— Sudden  death — Kepentance — "  Jenny  kissed  me." 


Johnson's  Motheb  and  Wife 507 

The  mother  and  wife  of  Dr.  Johnson — Samuel  ' '  the  Great' ' — 
Son  of  a  bookseller — His  false  pride — Incident  illustrating  it — 
His  parents — A  religious  mother — Not  a  happy  couple — John- 
son's teachers — Svinday  a  hard  day — His  mother's  instruction — ■ 
Afflicted  with  scrofula — Touched  by  Queen  Anne — A  child's  relic 
— Johnson's  poverty — His  affection  for  his  mother — Would  not 
marrj'  without  her  consent — Letters  to  his  mother — To  Miss 
Porter — Death  of  his  mother — "  Rasselas" — How  he  paid  the 
expenses  of  her  funeral — Granted  a  pension — Marriage — His 
bride — An  unequal  marriage — Description  of  Mrs.  Johnson — 
Johnson  an  unprepossessing  man — His  supreme  enjoyment — His 
absent-mindedness — Meeting  with  Hogarth — A  bad  habit — Lady 
Knight' s  account  o^  Mrs.  Johnson — Her  marriage  distasteful  to 
her  children — A  wedding  journey — The  ride  of  the  lovers — 
Struggles  with  poverty — Living  in  London — A  bookseller's 
drudge — Death  of  Mrs.  Johnson — A  funeral  sermon  preached — 
Inscription  on  his  wife's  tombstone — Dr.  Johnson' s prayer — Be- 
lief in  ghost  stories — Johnson's  fidelity — His  wife's  wedding  ring 
— A  mean  insinuation — Johnson's  belief  of  immortality — Sanc- 
tioned by  our  best  natures. 


Mothers  of  Antiquity 535 

Volumnia,  the  mother  of  Coriolanus — Aurelia,  the  mother  of 
Caesar — Olympia,  the  mother  of  Alexander — Octavia,  the  sis- 
ter of  Augustus  Cfesar — Agrippina,  the  mother  of  Nero — The 
mother  of  Symphorian — Helvia,  the  mother  of  Cicero — The 
mother  of  St.  Ambrose — The  mother  of  Jerome — Helena,  the 
mother  of  Constantine — Anthusa,  the  mother  of  Chrysostom — 
Paula,  the  recluse — Eachel,  the  daughter  of  Laban — Faustina, 
the  wife  of  Titus  Antoninus  Pius  and  mother  of  Annia  Faustina. 


xxil  TABLE   UF   CONTENTS. 


Maeie  Antoinette  as  Wife  and  Mother 346 

A  sad  stoiy — A  national  shame — A  tragedy  without  a  redeem- 
ing feature — Lafaj'ette— Condemnation  of  him — The  childhood 
of  Marie  Antoinette — Her  parents — The  family — Birthday  of 
Marie  Antoinette — One  of  sixteen  children — Her  early  home — 
Death  of  her  father — Her  mother's  ambitious  schemes — Mar- 
riage of  Marie  Antoinette  and  the  Dauj^hin  of  France — At  the 
age  of  fifteen — Wedding  festivities — Advice  of  Maria  Theresa — 
An  accident — Earlier  years  of  married  life  — At  Little  Trianon — 
The  dujie  of  designing  j^ersons — A  giddy  j'oung  queen — Letter 
to  her  mother — Birth  of  a  princess — A  hapj^y  young  mother  — 
Her  miinificent  bequests — Death  of  Maria  Theresa — A  son  born 
—His  early  death— The  third  child—"  The  little  Norman"— The 
fourth  and  last  child — An  historian's  error  regarding  these  chil- 
dren— Before  the  Kevolution — Marie  Antoinette's  account  of  the 
Daui^hin — "  Poor  little  Louis"^ — The  j^ear  1789 — Changed  posi- 
tion of  the  Queen — The  storming  of  the  Hotel  des  Invalides — 
The  King  and  Queen  at  Versailles—"  Sire,  I  am  at  mj'  j^ost" — A 
vacillating  King— The  Queen  urges  in  vain — Versailles  attacked 
— A  iDainful  procession — The  Queen's  prediction — The  Keign  of 
Teri'or — At  the  Tuileries — Attemj^ts  made  to  murder  the  Queen — 
The  flight  and  capture  of  the  King  and  Queen — Napoleon  Bona- 
parte's remark— Brutal  treatment  of  the  Daiiphin — Simon  the 
shoemaker — The  fete  in  the  Champ  de  Mars — The  King  beheaded 
— Marie  Antoinette  in  prison — Separated  from  her  children — 
The  Princess  Elizabeth — Last  letter  of  the  Queen — Never  re- 
ceived— Not  of  herself,  but  of  others  she  thought — The  Queen 
beheaded — An  English  lady's  description  of  her  in  prison — A 
noble  and  heroic  woman — Her  characteristics — The  Princess 
Elizabeth  beheaded — A  beautiful  character. 


The  Mother  of  Burns 581 

A  sagacious  woman — The  poet  like  his  mother — An  illiterate 
■woman — Beared  by  her  grandmother — Marriage  to  William  Burncs 
— The  family  home — Her  husband's  fine  character — A  happy  mar- 
riage-The  dying  words  of  the  husband  and  father — Anxiety  re- 
garding his  son — That  son  a  reproach — A  sorrowing  mother— Her 
son  a  poet — Remembers  his  mother  and  sisters — Jean  Armour 
— Her  union  with  Burns— A  father — Letters  to  Mrs.  Dunlop  and 
Miss  Chalmers- -A  picture  of  his  wife — Loves  her  to  distraction 
after  all — The  mother's  admiration  of  the  son — Her  favorites 
among  his  poems — Jean  Armour  a  good  wife— A  characteristic 


TABLE   OF   CONTENTS.  xsiii 

account  of  him — ' '  I  wish  ye  had  but  seen  him" — Death  of  Burns 
— Last  message  to  his  mother — His  wife's  last  years — Placed 
above  want. 


Shokt  Sketches  of  some  Wives  and  Mothees 597 

LucretiaMott  ;  the  mothers  of  Leon  Gambetta,  George  Sand, 
George  Eliot,  Immanuel  Kant,  Cromwell  ;  the  wife  of  the  Duke 
of  Marlborough  ;  the  mothers  of  Daniel  Webster,  Sismondi, 
Schiller,  Isaac  Watts,  Christina  of  Sweden,  Chateaubriand,  Gray, 
Dumas,  BufEon,  Alexander  Pope,  Curran,  Fenelon,  Cowley, 
Thomas  a  Becket,  Campbell,  Crabbe,  Thomson,  U.  S.  Grant. 


Abigail  Adams 635 

A  great  woman — Her  husband — A  descendant  of  Puritan  ances- 
try— Sidney  Smith's  remark — A  famous  letter-writer — Her  lack 
of  opportunities—  Eemarkable  characteristics — Long  separations 
from  her  husband— Her  political  wisdom — Letter  to  her  hus- 
band— Eights  of  women — Asks  for  justice — The  Constitution  of 
the  United  States— An  unjust  document — Mrs.  Adams's  disap- 
pointment— The  evils  of  absolute  power — Mrs.  Adams's  home 
life— Her  children— Mr.  Adams  in  Europe— Her  reply  to  a  ques- 
tioner— Her  journey  to  England — The  Minister  to  St.  James — 
A  delicate  position —  Eeturn  to  the  United  States— Mr.  Adams 
vice-president — Eichmond  Hill — Eemoval  to  Philadelphia — The 
Eepublican  court — Letters  to  her  daughter— Incident  regarding 
Washington — The  seat  of  government  removed  to  Washington-=- 
President  Adams  defeated — Letter  to  her  son— Differences  be- 
tween Adams  and  Jefferson— Mrs.  Adams'sletters  to  Jefferson — 
Views  on  woman's  education — Ketirement  to  private  life — Her 
influence  over  her  husband— Her  death— Her  son's  eulogy  of 
her. 


Mothers  of  Great  Men  md  Women. 


A    REPUBLICAN    MOTHER. 

MARY    WASHINGTON. 

Had  the  mother  of  Washington  been  associated  with 
the  daily  life  of  her  distinguished  son  after  he  reached 
man's  estate,  hers  would  have  been  a  familiar  historical 
character.  As  she  was  not,  the  world  knows  but  the 
barest  incidents  of  her  life  as  compared  with  its 
knowledge  of  Washington's  wife.  In  the  various  biog- 
raphies of  Washington  there  is  the  same  brief  state- 
ment of  general  facts  concerning  her,  and  allusions  to 
her  death,  and  the  monument  that  was  erected  to  her 
memory  during  the  administration  of  President  An- 
drew Jackson.  There  are  nowhere  to  be  found  any 
letters  of  hers  to  her  son,  and  not  many  of  his  friends 
of  later  years  ever  saw  her.  She  lived  to  a  good  old 
age — eighty- three  years— and  in  the  half -century  that 
preceded  her  death  her  son  was  the  foremost  actor  in 
some  of  the  most  stirring  and  important  events  that 
have  ever  transpired  in  the  world's  history.  That  she 
was  an  intelligent  and  interested  observer  of  public 
affairs  cannot  be  questioned  in  view  of  the  fact  that 
she  was  a  woman  of  strong  character  and  native  ability. 
Her  son  wrote  her  regularly  whUe  engaged  in  his  busi- 


26  MARY    WASHINGTON. 

ness  of  surveyor,  and  afterward  when  an  officer  of  the 
Virginia  militia,  and  subsequently  while  absent  from 
home  for  six  years,  during  the  Revolutionary  War.  It 
is  to  be  regretted  that  none  of  her  letters  have  a  place 
in  the  popular  histories  of  colonial  times,  for  doubtless 
they  were  a  readal^le  record  of  her  quiet  life  in  Fred- 
ericksburg. And  it  is  more  to  be  deplored  that  the 
young  of  this  country  have  not  had  better  opportunity 
to  study  her  noble  character  than  has  been  i)ossible. 

Like  the  mothers  of  all  great  and  earnest  men,  she 
was  a  praying  woman.  Her  Bible  was  her  constant 
companion,  audits  precepts  were  ever  on  her  lips.  She 
realized  most  perfectly  De  Tocqueville' s  definition  of 
life — "a  state  of  neither  pain  nor  pleasure,  but  a  serious 
business  to  be  entered  ujion  with  courage  in  the  spuit 
of  self-sacrifice."  A  silent,  serious  woman  she  was, 
self-contained,  self-respecting,  and  reserved.  During 
the  forty-six  years  of  her  widowhood  she  managed 
her  household  and  farm  without  the  assistance  of  any 
adviser,  and  reared  her  children  to  usefulness  and 
honor,  and  saw  them  go  forth  into  the  world  equipped 
for  its  work  and  pain.  That  they  each  and  all  revered 
her,  and  sought  her  counsel  in  every  emergency,  is 
sufficient  testimony  of  her  worth  and  ability. 

Mrs.  Washington's  lack  of  personal  ambition  and 
her  constitutional  reserve  were  qualities  whi(;h  pre- 
vented her  from  becoming  popularly  known  to  the  pub- 
lic, even  at  a  time  when  the  people  were  eager  for  any 
opportunity  to  show  her  honor.  But  no  demonstra- 
tion was  ever  made  in  her  behalf,  and  there  is  but  one 
instance  recorded  when  she  appeared  in  public  with 
her  son.     This  was  after  the  surrender  of  Lord  Corn- 


SIMILARITY   BETWEEN   MOTHER    AND   SON.  27 

■u'allis,  when  AVasliington,  accompanied  by  his  suite 
and  many  distinguished  military  men,  went  to  Fred- 
ericksburg. A  grand  ball  was  given  in  his  honor,  and 
the  proud  old  mother  was  the  belle  of  the  evening,  the 
observed  of  all  observers  as  she  passed  from  group  to 
group,  leaning  on  the  arm  of  lier  happy  son.  The 
beautiful  devotion  of  Washington  to  his  mother  en- 
deared him  to  her  neighbors  and  to  the  people  of 
Virginia,  and  the  honors  that  were  paid  him  on  that 
occasion  were  doubly  sincere  because  they  were  a' 
recognition  of  his  worth,  not  alone  as  a  patriot,  but  as 
a  son. 

Mother  and  son  were  much  alike  in  character,  per- 
sonal appearance,  and  conduct.  Both  were  wanting 
in  humor  and  imagination,  and  both  possessed  in  an  ex- 
treme degree  conscientiousness,  gentleness,  and  deter- 
mination. AVashington,  in  the  most  trying  emergency 
of  his  career  as  commander-in-chief,  did  not  display 
more  self-control  and  courage  than  did  his  mother  in 
hiding  from  her  children  for  months  and  years  the 
distressing  fact  that  she  was  a  sufferer  from  cancer. 
This  circumstance  it  was  that  strengthened  her  resolve 
to  live  alone,  which  she  did  up  to  the  last  few  months 
of  her  life,  and  her  mode  of  life  probably  had  much 
to  do  with  prolonging  her  existence  to  the  great  age 
she  attained. 

The  last  duty  that  Washington  performed  previous 
to  leaving  Virginia  for  the  seat  of  Avar  at  the  breaking 
out  of  the  rebellion,  was  to  go  to  Fredericksburg  and 
remove  his  mother  from  the  country  into  thecitv,  where 
her  married  daughter  was  residing.  He  was  unwilling 
to  go  away  leaving  her  on  the  fann,  and  to  overcome 


28  MARY   WASHINGTON. 

her  opposition  lie  knew  that  a  i:)ersonal  appeal  must 
be  made.  The  i^rospects  of  a  long  war  and  the  un- 
certainty of  his  return  were  shown  her  in  their  con- 
versation, and  when  convinced  that  it  was  to  add  to  his 
peace  of  mind  when  away,  she  consented,  and  removed 
at  once,  leaving  a  competeht  man  in  charge  of  the 
farm,  subject  to  her  daily  supervision.  And  sui^ervise 
it  she  did  every  day  of  her  life,  riding  about  the  fields, 
du'ecting  the  planting  and  the  gathering  of  crops, 
ordering  repairs,  and  buying  supplies.  She  had  what 
would  now  be  termed  an  old-fashioned  buggy  and  a  gen- 
tle horse,  and  every  morning  both  were  before  her  door 
awaiting  her.  She  lived  out  of  doors  the  greater  part 
of  the  later  years  of  her  life.  Her  children  were 
grown  and  gone  from  her,  and  her  eldest  son  was  en- 
gaged in  duties  that  exposed  him  more  or  less  to  con- 
stant danger  and  separated  him  almost  entu'ely  from 
her.  It  was  -wisdom  in  her  so  to  live,  and  the  disease 
that  had  very  gradually  come  upon  her  was  kept  at 
bay  for  many  years  by  her  uniform,  quiet,  and  peace- 
fid  life.  Where  another  mother  of  less  fortunate 
temperament  would  have  found  occasion  for  constant 
worry  and  anxiety,  in  her  son's  prolonged  absence  and 
trying  if  high  position,  Mrs.  Washington  fretted  not  at 
all,  and  troubled  no  one  with  her  heart  experiences. 
She  had  great  native  sense,  and  she  was  strong  of  ^^ill 
and  firm  of  faith,  and  her  outlook  on  life  was  in  con- 
sequence extended. 

In  a  word,  she  was  a  great  woman,  and  subject  her 
life  to  whatever  side  lights  w-e  may,  we  find  no  angu- 
larities, no  painful  contrasts,  no  contradictions.  She 
was   a   consistent  Christian,    and  one   who  lived  out 


A   SUCCESSFUL   DISCIPLINARIAN.  29 

every  prayer  she  uttered  and  every  resolve  she  made. 
From  the  beginning  to  the  end,  through  eighty-three 
eventful  years,  she  was  in  all  places  wheresoever  placed 
a  good  woman.  Let  us  glance  over  it  and  see  how 
smooth  and  even  was  the  web  and  woof  of  her  life 
history.  Quietly  and  patiently  she  spun,  but  indus- 
triously and  with  determination.  Those  who  entertain 
the  idea  that  Mrs.  Washington  was  a  colorless  char- 
acter, do  themselves  a  wrong  to  continue  in  such  error. 
She  was  one  of  the  finest  characters  of  the  Revolution- 
ary period,  and  while  not  possessed  of  many  of  the 
graces  and  accomplishments  that  women  delight  in, 
she  had  exceeding  good  sense,  great  business  ability, 
and  an  influence  over  others  that,  if  there  was  no  other 
evidence  of  her  individuality,  would  prove  her  to  have 
been  remarkable.  As  has  been  said,  she  was  a  devout' 
woman,  and  however  far  modern  materialism  may 
extend  its  influence  and  bias  criticism,  it  can  never 
gainsay  the  fact  that  the  best  mothers,  the  most  suc- 
cessful family  disciplinarians,  were  and  ,are  women 
of  strong  religious  natures  —  j)raying  women  who, 
believing  with  all  their  hearts  in  the  power  and  efBcacy 
of  iDrayer,  made  it  the  first  great  duty  of  their  lives  to 
train  their  children  in  the  same  belief. 

Mary  Washington  came  of  pious  stock.  Her  mother 
was  a  devout  person,  and  her  ancestors  were  Covenant- 
ers. 

As  a  child  on  her  father's  Virginia  plantation,  Mary 
Ball  was  trained  religiously,  and  as  she  grew  to  woman- 
hood she  became  a  church  member,  and  all  her  asso- 
ciations were  of  a  religious  nature.  The  children  of 
the  early  settlers  of  this  country  and  their  immediate 


30  -  MARY   WASHINGTON. 

descendants  were  strenuous  advocates  of  clinrcli  wor- 
sliip,  and  they  gave  of  their  means  and  their  time  to 
build  meeting-houses.  The  Sabbath  wsis  tlie  day  of 
all  others  most  filled  with  important  duties.  All  the 
week  the  colonists  worked  hard,  and  at  the  meetings 
on  Lord's  day  they  met  together  and  were  companions 
in  devotion.  There  was  a  solemnity  and  a  seriousness 
about  the  meetings  that  do  not  characterize  church 
gatherings  to-day,  except  in  the  wilderness,  and  chil- 
dren trained  by  active  Christians  saw  the  solemn  and 
grave  side  of  religion  almost  exclusively.  They  learned 
the  Bible,  and  could  repeat  large  portions  of  it,  and  in 
their  conversations  with  their  elders  they  were  respect- 
ful and  obedient  to  a  degree  not  understood  by  the 
young  of  to-day. 

'  Mary  Ball  was,  by  reason  of  her  careful  rearing  and 
her  natural  disposition,  altogether  fitted  for  the  posi- 
tion of  stepmother,  which  position  she  assumed  when 
she  became  the  wife  of  Augustine  Washington,  her 
father's  friend  and  neighbor.  She  was  twenty-four 
years  old  when  she  married — an  iige  not  considered 
very  young  in  that  day.  The  young  ladies  of  the  Old 
Dominion  married  very  earlv,  and  there  were  few 
among  them  avIio  remained  single  until  they  liad 
passed  their  teens.  A  wedding  was  the  event  of  a 
lifetime,  and  the  people,  accustomed  to  but  few  forms 
of  amusement,  made  such  an  entertainment  one  of 
great  importance.  The  hospitality  of  the  bride's 
parents  was  limited  only  by  the  size  of  their  homes, 
and  the  preparations  were  on  a  scale  of  generosity 
characteristic  of  well-to-do  farmers  in  a  new  country. 
The  wedding  at  Farmer  Ball's  on  March  Gth,  1730,  was 


THE    WASHINGTOXS.  31 

not  unlike  the  typical  Virginia  wedding.  Mary  was 
a  beloved  daughter,  and  she  was  marrying  a  trusted 
man,  one  who  had  lived  a  near  neighbor  for  years,  and 
was  an  eligible  match  for  the  favorite  child  of  the 
house,  A  large  company  took  part  in  the  festivities 
that  followed  the  marriage  ceremony,  and  the  young 
bride  left  her  father's  house  accompanied  by  the  fond 
wishes  of  true  friends. 

The  Washington s  were  planters  of  considerable 
means  in  AVestmoreland  County,  and  the  home  to 
which  Augustine  conducted  his  wife  was  one  of  the 
most  comfortable  in  that  section  of  country.  The 
house  was  situated  on  an  eminence  aboiit  half  a  mile 
from  the  Potomac  River,  and  commanded  a  view  of 
the  Maryland  shore  for  many  miles.  The  dwelling 
was  of  frame,  with  a  steep  roof  which  sloped  down 
into  projecting  eaves.  It  was  but  one  story,  and  con- 
tained four  large  rooms  and  an  entrance  hall  of  con- 
siderable dimensions.  At  each  end  of  the  house  on  the 
outside  was  an  enormous  chimney.  From  the  river 
the  house  was  an  attractive  one,  and  the  grounds 
about  it,  which  were  not  discernible  from  that  point, 
were  well  tended  and  adorned  with  fine  shrubs  and 
flowers. 

In  this  pretty  country  home  was  born,  on  the  22d 
of  February,  1732,  George,  the  first  child  of  Mary  and 
Augustine  Washington.  When  in  the  fulness  of  time 
this  child  became  the  military  hero  of  his  country, 
historians  and  others  industriously  studied  the  gene- 
alogy of  the  Washington  family,  and  rescued  from 
oblivion  everv  obtainable  fact  concerning  them  from 
remotest   antiquity.     But   with   the    ancestry   of   the 


32  MARY  WASHINGTON. 

mother  of  Washington  the  world  concerned  itself  but 
little.  It  is  nevertheless  a  fact  that  from  his  mother 
he  inherited  his  strongest  qualities  of  mind,  and  to 
her  he  owed  his  fine  physique.  It  would  be  interest- 
ing to  know  more  than  it  is  now  j)ossible  to  learn  of 
her  ancestry,  for  the  reason  that  her  famous  son  in- 
herited from  her  the  characteristics  that  made  his  name 
a  familiar  one  the  world  over.  Before  him  no  Wash- 
ington had  achieved  fame,  and  since  his  time  none  of 
the  name  have  acquired  i)ublic  rej^utation. 

Inflexible  in  courage  and  unyielding  in  purpose,  the 
mother  might  have  been  a  Spartan,  She  certainly  was 
imbued  with  the  heroic  spirit  of  the  Covenanters,  and 
was  a  better  development  than  the  Spartan  or  the  Cove- 
nanter.    She  was  a  happy  American  mother  and  wife. 

Six  children  were  born  to  Mr,  and  Mrs,  Washington, 
five  of  whom  lived  to  maturity.  When  the  eldest  was 
six  years  of  age  the  family  removed  from  their  West- 
moreland home  to  a  large  tract  of  land  on  the  Rap- 
pahannock River,  opposite  Fredericksburg.  It  was 
not  a  thickly  settled  j^ortion  of  Virginia  at  the  time, 
and  the  Indians,  though  ostensibly  friendly,  were  still 
a  menace  to  the  settlers.  The  conversation  of  the 
parents,  which  their  little  son  listened  to  with  interest, 
was  often  on  this  subject,  and  it  was  in  this  new  home 
that  he  first  exhibited  his  strong  liking 'for  military 
life. 

Mr.  Washington  owned  many  slaves,  and  it  required 
an  industrious  housewife  to  manage  and  provide  for  so 
large  a  family.  The  spinning-wheel  and  the  weaver's 
loom,  the  sewing-room  and  the  seamstresses  required 
constant  watching.     There  could  be  no  better  position 


RELIGIOUS   HABITS.  33 

for  tlie  development  and  cultivation  of  order,  dis- 
cipline, habits  of  economy,  and  method  than  the  one 
filled  by  Mrs.  Washington.  The  home  was  one  of 
I)lenty  and  order,  and  there  were  no  grinding  cares  or 
pecuniary  anxieties  to  strain  the  nerves  of  the  wife 
and  mother,  or  mar  the  contentment  of  the  home 
circle.  It  was  a  very  religious  household  :  both  father 
and  mother  were  members  of  the  Episcopal  Church,  and 
were  strict  observers  of  the  rules  of  their  denomina- 
tion. Family  prayers  were  said  morning  and  evening. 
The  Bible  was  read,  and  the  servants  of  the  household 
were  always  present.  The  mother  instructed  her  chil- 
dren constantly  on  religious  subjects,  and  as  often  as 
not  her  reproofs  were  made  in  scriptural  language. 
For  any  sign  of  insubordination  she  would  use  as  a 
corrective  rod  not  the  scolding  words  of  an  impatient 
mother,  but  would  repeat  in  measured  tones  such 
aw^ul  warnings  as  this,  for  instance,  "  The  eye  that 
mocketh  at  his  father,  and  despiseth  to  obey  his 
mother,  the  ravens  of  the  valley  shall  pick  it  out,  and 
the  young  eagles  shall  eat  it ;' '  or  if  a  lesson  in  obedi- 
ence needed  to  be  inculcated,  the  serious  and  ever- 
ready  mother  would  take  her  little  child  upon  her 
knee,  and  have  it  repeat  after  her  the  words, 
"  Honor  thy  father  and  thy  mother,"  and  then  slowly 
and  patiently  continue  the  commandment,  making 
clear  to  the  interested  impil  the  promise  that  follows 
it.  In  this  way  she  inspired  their  hearts  Tvdth  respect, 
and  imi^ressed  upon  their  unfolding  minds  the  dignity 
and  resjDonsibility  of  a  mother. 

Not   only   did   her   own   children  look  up   to   and 
venerate  her,  but    her  stepchildren  were  devoted  to 


34:  MARY   WASHINGTON. 

her,  and  in  after  years,  when  her  children  were  grown 
up,  their  half-brothers  took  the  tenderest  interest  in 
them,  and  George  was  not  only  put  forward  in  his 
career  by  Lawrence,  but  was  his  sole  heir  on  the  death 
of  the  latter.  From  him  George  inherited  Mount 
Vernon. 

Mr.  Washington  died  at  the  age  of  forty-nine  years, 
leaving  to  his  wife  the  responsibility  of  rearing  her 
young  children,  the  eldest  of  whom  was  but  a  small 
lad.     Washington  Irving  says  of  this  time  : 

"  George,  now  eleven  years  of  age,  and  the  other 
children  of  the  second  marriage  had  been  left  under 
the  guardianship  of  their  mother  to  Avhom  was  in- 
trusted the  proceeds  of  all  their  property  until  they 
should  severalh'  come  of  age.  She  j^i'oved  herself 
worthy  of  the  trust.  Endowed  with  plain,  dkect  good 
sense,  thorough  conscientiousness,  and  prompt  decision, 
she  governed  her  family  strictly  but  kindly,  exacting 
deference  while  she  inspired  affection.  George,  being 
her  eldest  son,  was  thought  to  be  her  favorite,  yet  she 
never  gave  him  undue  preference,  and  the  implicit 
deference  exacted  from  him  in  childhood  continued  to 
be  habitually  observed  by  him  to  the  day  of  her  death. 
He  inherited  from  her  a  high  temper  and  a  spirit  of 
command,  but  her  early  p^recepts  and  example  taught 
him  to  restrain  and  govern  that  temper,  and  to  square 
his  conduct  on  the  exact  principles  of  equity  and 
justice." 

Mrs.  Washington  found  little  difficult}^  in  bringing 
up  her  children.  Thej^  were  disciplined  to  obedience, 
and  a  simple  word  was  her  command.  She  was  not 
given  to  any  display  of  petulance  or  rage,   but  was 


A  PEN    PICTURE.  35 

steady,  well-balanced,  and  unvarying  in  her  mood. 
That  she  was  dignified  even  to  stateliness  is  shown  us 
by  the  statement  made  by  Lawrence  Washington  oi 
Chotauk,  a  relative  and  playmate  of  George  in  boy- 
hood, who  was  often  a  guest  at  her  house.  He  says  : 
"  I  was  often  there  with  George — his  j^laymate,  school- 
mate, and  young  man's  companion.  Of  the  mother  I 
was  ten  times  more  afraid  than  I  ever  was  of  my  own 
j)arents.  She  awed  me  in  the  midst  of  her  kindness, 
for  she  was  indeed  truly  kind.  I  have  often  been 
present  with  her  sons,  j)roper  tall  fellows  too,  and  we 
were  all  as  mute  as  mice  ;  and  even  now,  when  time 
has  whitened  my  locks,  and  I  am  the  grandparent  of  a 
second  generation,  I  could  not  behold  that  remarkable 
woman  without  feelings  it  is  impossible  to  describe. 
Whoever  has  seen  that  awe-inspiring  air  and  manner, 
so  characteristic  in  the  Father  of  his  Country,  will 
remember  the  matron  as  she  appeared  when  the  pre- 
siding genius  of  her  well-ordered  household,  command- 
ing and  being  obeyed." 

Allied  to  this  spirit  of  command  were  gentle  qual- 
ities which  made  obedience  to  her  wishes  an  easy  task. 
It  is  related  of  her  that  on  one  occasion,  having 
ordered  a  person  in  her  employ  to  do  a  piece  of  work 
in  a  certain  way,  she  was  surprised  to  find  that  he  had 
disobeyed  her.  He  explained  that  he  had  a  better 
plan,  when  she  reminded  him  that  she  had  commanded, 
and  there  was  nothing  left  for  him  but  to  obey.  There 
was  no  occasion  for  a  second  reprimand  in  that  direc- 
tion. 

Mr.  SjDarks,  than  whom  there  is  no  better  authority, 
credits  her  with  the  jDossession  of  assiduity,  tender- 


36  MARY    WASHINGTON. 

ness,  and  vigilance,  as  well  as  an  indomitable  will,  and 
says  : 

"  As  the  richest  reward  of  a  mother's  solicitude  and 
toil,  she  had  the  hax3i3iness  to  see  all  her  children  come 
forward  with  a  fair  j^romise  into  life,  filling  the  sphere 
allotted  to  them  in  a  manner  equally  honorable  to 
themselves  and  to  the  parent  who  had  been  the  only 
guide  of  their  principles,  conduct,  and  habits.  She 
lived  to  witness  the  noble  career  of  her  eldest  son,  till 
by  his  own  rare  merits  he  was  raised  to  the  head  of  a 
nation  and  applauded  and  revered  by  the  whole  world. 
It  has  been  said  that  there  never  was  a  great  man,  the 
elements  of  whose  greatness  might  not  be  traced  to  the 
original  characteristics  or  early  influence  of  his  mother. 
If  this  be  true,  how  much  do  mankind  owe  to  the 
mother  of  Washington  !" 

George  Washington  Parke  Custis  said  of  her  : 

"  The  mother  of-  Washington,  in  forming  him  for 
those  distinguished  parts  he  was  destined  to  perform, 
first  taught  him  the  duties  of  obedience,  the  better  to 
prei)are  him  for  those  of  command.  In  the  well- 
ordered  domicile  where  his  early  years  were  passed, 
the  levity  and  indulgence  common  to  youth  were  tern- 
pered  by  a  deference  and  well-regulated  restraint 
which,  while  it  curtailed  or  suppressed  no  rational 
enjoyment  usual  in  the  spring-time  of  life,  prescribed 
those  enjoyments  within  the  bounds  of  moderation  and 
propriety. 

"  The  matron  held  in  reserve  an  authority  which 
never  departed  from  her,  not  even  when  her  son  had 
become  the  most  illustrious  of  men.  It  seemed  to  say, 
'  I  am  your  mother,  the  being  who  gave  you  life,  the 


HER   SON'S   APPEAL   DENIED.  37 

guide  wlio  directed  your  steps  when  they  needed  the 
guidance  of  age  and  wisdom,  the  parental  affection 
which  claimed  your  love,  the  parental  authority  which 
commanded  your  obedience  ;  whatever  may  be  your 
success,  whatever  your  renown,  next  to  your  God  you 
owe  most  to  me. '  Nor  did  the  chief  dissent  from  these 
truths,  but  to  the  last  moment  of  the  life  of  his  vener- 
able parent,  he  yielded  to  her  will  the  most  dutiful, 
nuplicit  obedience,  and  felt  for  her  person  and  char- 
acter the  most  holy  reverence  and  attachment." 

Mrs.   Washington  permitted  her  son  to  spend  his 
holidays  at  Mount  Vernon,  with  his  brother  Lawrence, 
and  there  he  was  brought  into  contact  with  military 
men  and  naval  officers.     The  martial  spirit  was  always 
strong  in  the  lad,  and  he  was  a  careful  listener  to  the 
conversations  held  in  the  bachelor  home  on  the  Poto- 
mac.    Lawrence  encouraged  George  in  his   desire  to 
become  a  military  man.     An  opportunity  offered  to 
secure  for  him  a  midshipman's  position  on  a  British 
man-of-war,  and  Lawrence  urged  Mrs.  Washington  to 
let  him  accept  it.     George  also  petitioned  her,  and  the 
trial  was  a  severe  one  to  her.    She  refused  finally,  on  the 
ground  that  there  was  no  reason  why  her  son  (he  was 
then  fourteen  years  of  age)  should  be  thrown  out  into 
the  world,  and  separated  so  far  from  his  kindred.     The 
pj'ofession  she  objected  to  also  as  one  that  would  take 
her  boy  from  her  permanently.     She  could  not  bring 
herself  to  see  that  it  was  to  his  advantage  to  go  to  sea, 
and  we  may  feel  assured  she  made  it  the  burden  of 
many  prayers. 

There  was  a  neighbor  of  hers  who  was  a  friend  of 
her  stepson' s,  and  this  man,  Mr.  Jackson,  at  the  request 


38  MARY    WASHINGTON. 

01  Lawrence,  went  to  see  her  regarding  the  matter 
which  he  advocated.  After  visiting  Mrs.  Washington, 
he  wrote  to  Lawrence  as  follows  : 

"  I  am  afraid  that  Mrs.  Washington  will  not  keep 
up  her  first  resolution.  She  seems  to  dislike  George's 
going  to  sea,  and  says  several  persons  have  told  her  it 
was  a  bad  scheme.  She  offers  several  trilling  objec- 
tions, such  as  fond,  unthinking  mothers  habitually 
suggest,  and  I  find  that  one  word  against  his  going- 
has  more  weight  than  ten  for  it. " 

Wise  Mr.  Jackson,  who  rated  his  worldly  judgment 
against  a  mother's  intuitions!  His  obtuseness  ■  in 
styling  her  an  "  unthinking"  mother  was  sufficient  to 
have  made  a  woman  of  her  strong  sense  distrust  advice 
from  such  a  quarter.  Had  she  been  persuaded  against 
her  will,  her  son's  great  future  would  ha.ve  been  marred, 
and  the  proba])ilities  are  that  his  career  would  have 
been  a  comparatively  obscure  one.  And  Mr.  Jackson, 
whose  only  claim  to  immortality  is  based  upon  one 
interview  with  Mrs.  Washington,  lived  to  see  that  his 
judgment  of  her  was  unjust,  and  that  she  was  right  in 
her  refusal  to  let  her  son  go  to  sea. 

One  of  Washington's  biographers  affirms  that  "  the 
luggage  of  the  young  aspirant  for  naval  honors  was 
actually  conveyed  on  board  the  little  vessel  destined 
to  convey  him  to  his  new  post,  and  that  when  attempt- 
ing to  bid  adieu  to  his  only  parent,  his  previous  j'eso- 
lution  to  depart  was  for  the  first  time  subdued  in 
consequence  of  her  ill- concealed  dejection  and  her 
irrepressible  tears." 

It  is  hardly  likely  that  this  version  of  the  matter  is 
true,  since  her  son  had  never  in  liis  life  exhibited  a 


WHAT    WASHINGTON    IRVING  SAYS.  39 

disobedient  spirit,  and  Lawrence  Washington  was  not 
at  all  inclined  to  offend  her  by  urging  a  plan  after  she 
had  opposed  it. 

In  the  archives  of  Mount  Vernon  may  be  seen  to- 
day a  manual  compiled  by  Mrs.  Washington  from 
Sir  Matthew  Hale's  "Contemplations,  Moral  and 
Divine,"  which  she  wrote  out  for  her  son,  and  which 
he  preserved  until  the  day  of  his  death.  It  stands  to 
reason  that  a  son  wko  heeded  every  other  instruction 
would  yield  implicit  obedience  in  a  matter  of  so  much 
importance,  and  it  is  an  historical  fact  that  he  in  after 
years  alluded  to  it  with  expressions  of  gratitude  to  his 
mother  for  preventing  him  from  taking  a  stei;)  that 
would  have  been  unfortunate  if  not  fatal  to  his  future. 
A  quotation  from  \Vashington  Irving  is  applicable  in 
this  connection.  He  says,  after  speaking  of  the  ex- 
emplary manner  in  which  she  had  reared  her  children  : 

"The  deference  for  her  then  instilled  into  their 
minds  continued  throughout  life,  and  was  manifested 
by  Washington  when  at  the  height  of  his  power  and 
reputation.  Eminently  practical,  she  had  thwarted 
his  military  aspirings  when  he  was  about  to  seek 
honor  in  the  British  navy.  During  his  early  and  dis- 
astrt^us  campaigns  on  the  frontier  she  would  often 
shake  her  head  and  exclaim,  '  Ah,  George  had  better 
have  staved  at  home  and  cultivated  his  farm. ' 

"  Even  his  ultimate  success  and  renown  had  never 
dazzled,  however  much  they  may  have  gratified  her. 
Where  others  congratulated  her,  and  were  enthusiastic 
in  his  praise,  she  listened  in  silence,  and  would  tem- 
perately reply  that  he  had  been  a  good  son,  and  she 
believed  he  had  done  his  duty  as  a  man." 


40  MARY   WASHINGTON. 

It  was  not  a  great  wliile  after  tlie  circumstance  nar- 
rated above  that  the  French  and  Indian  War  broke  out, 
and  George  Washington  received  his  motlier  s  consent 
and  blessing  when  he  made  known  his  desire  to  go. 
From  that  time  henceforth  he  was  with  her  only  on 
occasional  visits.  After  his  marriage  he  settled  down  at 
Mount  Yernon,  and  lived  a  life  of  ease  and  retirement 
for  many  years,  until  the  breaking  out  of  the  Revolu- 
tionary War.  There  is  no  record  t>f  anv  visit  made  by 
Mrs.  Washington  at  any  time  to  Mount  Yernon,  nor  h 
there  any  account  of  any  meetings  or  interviews  between 
the  mother  and  the  wife  of  Washington.  That  there 
were  such  meetings  and  visits  are  almost  certain,  and 
Washington,  Ave  know,  was  often  a  guest  in  his  mother's 
house  at  Fredericksburg. 

When  the  war  broke  out  lie  paid  her,  as  has  been 
said,  a  visit  before  starting  north  to  assume  command. 
In  tlie  long  years  tliat  passed  before  she  saw  him 
again,  he  wrote  her  rei^eatedly,  and  lost  no  opportunity 
to  relieve  her  mind  of  anxiety  concernino;  him.  The 
lavish  praises  bestowed  upon  him  by  all  who  saw  her 
hardly  ever  received  any  other  recognition  than  a  quiet 
reminder  that  Providence  was  ordering  all  things. 
For  herself,  she  found  her  self-control  in  i^rayer,  5nd 
much  of  her  time  was  spent  alone. 

The  surrender  of  Cornwallis  at  Yorktown  was  the 
auspicious  event  that  hastened  their  reimion.  A  mes- 
senger was  sent  to  apprise  her  of  the  fact,  and  as  soon  as 
possible  jDublic  duties  were  laid  aside,  and  Washington 
visited  her,  attended  by  his  staff.  His  presence  in  Fred- 
ericksburg aroused  the  enthusiasm  of  all  classes.  For 
the  first  time  in  six  years  mother  and  son  met,  and  it 


A   BALL    AT   FREDERICKSBURG.  41 

may  be  imagined  that  her  heart  rejoiced  over  the  meet- 
ing. She  was  then  over  seventy  years  of  age,  and  was 
an  erect,  well-preserved  woman.  The  attentions  lavished 
npon  her  from  that  time  to  the  end  of  her  life  were  con 
tinnous,  and  she  had  greater  canse  than  any  othei* 
American  mother  to  rejoice  in  the  good  fortnne  of  her 
son.  On  this  occasion  the  x^eople  of  Fredericksburg  gave 
a  ball  in  his  honor,  and  it  was  attended  by  a  ]:)rilliant 
throng  of  military  officers  and  foreigners.  Mrs.  Wash- 
ington was  the  most  interesting  person  in  the  ball-room 
to  very  many  ^leople,  particularly  to  the  members  of  the 
staff  of  General  Washington  who  met  her  for  the  first 
time.  The  spectacle  of  a  woman  of  her  advanced 
years,  who  had  always  lived  a  secluded  life,  and  who 
was  consequently  expected  to  be  childish  and  indiffer- 
ent, moving  among  the  people  about  her,  an  interested 
and  entertaining  woman,  full  of  dignity  and  reserve, 
was  a  charming  one.  Washington  presented  the  Ameri- 
can and  European  officers  to  his  mother,  who  regarded 
her  with  undisguised  pleasure  and  astonishment.  Tradi-. 
tion  says  that  she  was  the  picture  of  beautiful  sim- 
plicity, moving  among  the  dazzling  throng  dressed  in 
the  appropriate  costume  of  a  Virginia  matron  of  the 
olden  time. 

Another  occasion  when  Mrs.  Wasliington  apjjeared 
to  great  advantage  in  the  eyes  of  a  foreign  officer  was 
when  the  Marquis  de  La  Fayette  visited  Fredericks- 
luirg  especially  to  bid  her  good-by.  Accompanied 
b}'  a  grandson  of  Mrs.  Washington,  he  ax^proached  the 
house,  and  saw  the  venerable  lady  working  in  her 
garden.  She  wore  a  homespun  dress,  and  her  snow- 
white  hair  was  covered  with  a  sun-bonnet. 


42  MARr  WASHINGTON. 


u 


All,  Marquis,''  slie  exclaimed,  as  soon  as  she 
recognized  her  guest,  "you  see  an  old  woman;  but 
come,  I  can  make  you  welcome  to  my  poor  dwelling 
without  the  parade  of  changing  my  dress. " 

Her  amiable  visitor  enjoyed  her  welcome,  and  closed 
his  long  visit  with  a  request  that  she  would  give  him 
her  blessing  to  take  back  with  him  to  France.  He 
loved  his  hero  chief,  and  the  reverence  he  felt  toward 
the  mother  of  that  chief  was  sincere  and  intense. 

At  the  close  of  the  Revolution  Washington  endeavor- 
ed, as  he  had  done  before,  to  have  his  mother  reside  with 
him  at  Mount  Vernon.  She  was  now  past  seventy,  and 
he  was  unwilling  that  she  should  live  alone  at  her  time 
of  life.  Her  children  all  shared  this  feeling,  and  Mrs. 
Lewis,  whose  husband  was  a  devoted  son-in-law,  opened 
his  home  to  her  repeatedly,  and  beseeched  her  to  stay 
with  her  daughter.  ISTothing  could  shake  her  determi- 
nation. Her  reply  was,  "  I  thank  you  for  your  dutiful 
and  affectionate  offers,  but  my  wants  are  few  in  this 
life,  and  I  feel  perfectly  competent  to  take  care  of 
myself." 

Very  often  Washington  visited  her,  and  always  with 
increasing  anxiety.  In  his  published  correspondence 
are  many  records  of  his  visit  to  her.  He  offers  as  an 
explanation  of  his  delay  in  replying  to  a  letter  of  the 
Secretary  of  Congress,  that  he  has  been  on  a  journey  to 
Fredericksburg  to  see  his  aged  parent.  At  another 
time  he  gives  the  same  reason  to  another  official,  and 
he  tells  a  friend  that  he  has  been  absent  from  Mount 
Vernon  for  some  days  looking  after  his  mother's  com- 
fort and  interests.  During  the  latter  portion  of  her 
life,   when  the  ])itiless    disease  from  which   she   had 


WASHINGTON'S   FAREWELL   VISIT.  4o 

suffered  for  years  was  making  rapid  headway,  it  was 
her  habit  to  repair  daily  to  a  secluded  spot  near  her 
dwelling,  and  there  commune  with  her  Maker.  She 
sought  by  this  means  to  gain  strength  to  live  out  her 
days  without  harrowing  the  feelings  of  others  with 
the  sight  of  her  sufferings.  But  for  this  disease,  cancer 
in  the  breast,  which  had  exhibited  itself  years  before, 
she  would  in  all  probability  have  lived  with  her  son, 
or  at  least  her  daughter.  But  as  long  as  she  could 
hide  the  cruel  secret  from  her  children,  she  did,  and  it 
was  not  until  the  last  years  of  her  life  that  her  son 
knew  of  it.  His  alarm  and  anxiety  she  quieted  by 
her  resolute  course,  and  her  own  courage  and  calmness 
helped  the  others.* 

When  Washington  was  elected  President  of  the 
United  States,  he  paid  her  a  farewell  visit.  He  was 
soon  to  start  for  the  seat  of  government,  and  he  felt 
that  he  would  not  see  her  again.  This  was  the  year  of 
her  death,  and  she  knew  when  she  gave  him  her  last 
blessing  that  the  end  was  not  far  off.  The  separation 
was  intensely  i^ainful  to  him.  He  rested  his  head  on 
her  shoidder  while  she  folded  her  feeble  arms  about 
his  neck.  Both  wept,  the  mother  silently,  while 
Washington,  unable  to  control  his  feelings,  sobbed  as 
she  gently  released  herself  from  his  embrace.  She 
bade  him  do  the  duty  Providence  had  assigned  him, 
and  live  his  life  through  with  her  blessing  on  his  head. 


*  Mrs.  Washington's  children  ^vere  George,  Betty  (Mrs.  Lewis), 
Samuel,  John  Augustine,  Charles,  and  Mildred.  The  latter  died  in 
infancy,  and  the  three  sons  lived  on  separate  plantations  in  Virginia 
left  them  by  their  father.  Their  descendants  are  among  the  best 
citizens  of  the  old  Commonwealth. 


44  MARY   WASHINGTON. 

* 

The  trial  was  bitter  to  her,  because  she  was  fast 
hastening  away,  and  wonkl  have  gladly  had  his  loving 
support  to  the  end.  But  it  was  not  to  be,  and  control- 
ling herself  with  great  effort,  she  met  the  parting  with 
more  composure  than  he  could  summon. 

After  intense  sufferings,  she  died  on  the  evening  of 
the  25th  of  August,  1789,  in  her  eighty-third  year,  and 
the  forty-sixth  of  her  widowhood.  Mrs.  Lewis,  after 
the  last  sad  rites  were  paid  her,  wrote  to  Washington  in- 
forming him  of  the  end.  He  had  been  extremely  ill,  and 
the  intelligence  deeply  affected  him.  His  letter  in 
rejAy  was  as  follows  : 

"New  York,  13  September,  1789. 

"  My  dear  Sister  :  Awful  and  affecting  as  the  death  of  a  parent 
is,  there  is  consolation  in  knowing  that  Heaven  has  spared  ours  to  an 
age  beyond  which  few  attain,  and  favored  her  with  the  full  enjoy- 
ment of  her  faculties,  and  as  much  bodily  strength  as  usually  falls  to 
the  lot  of  fourscore.  Under  these  considerations,  and  a  hope  that 
she  is  translated  to  a  happier  place,  it  is  the  duty  of  her  relatives  to 
yield  due  submission  to  the  decrees  of  the  Creator.  When  I  was  last 
at  Fredericksburg.  I  took  a  final  leave  of  my  mother,  never  expect- 
ing to  see  her  more. 

"  It  will  be  impossible  for  me  ut  this  distance,  and  circumstanced 
as  I  am,  to  give  the  smallest  attention  to  the  execution  of  lier  will  ; 
nor,  indeed,  is  much  required,  if,  as  she  directs,  no  security  should 
be  given,  nor  appraisement  made  of  her  estate  ;  but  that  the  same 
should  be  allotted  to  the  devisees  with  as  little  trouble  and  delay  as 
may  be.  IIow  far  this  is  legal,  I  know  not.  ^Mr.  Merced  can,  and 
I  have  no  doubt  would  advise  you,  if  asked,  which  I  wish  you  to  do. 
If  the  ceremony  of  inventorying,  appraising,  etc.,  can  be  dispensed 
with,  all  the  rest,  as  the  will  declares  that  few  or  no  debts  are 
owing,  can  be  done  with  very  little  trouble.  Every  person  may,  in 
that  case,  immediately  receive  what  is  specially  devised.  Were  it 
not  that  the  specific  legacies,  which  are  given  to  me  by  the  will,  are 


HER    GRAVE.  45 

meant  and  ought  to  be  considered  and  received  as  mementoes  of 
paternal  affection  in  the  last  solemn  act  of  life,  I  should  not  be 
desirous  of  receiving  or  removing  them  ;  but  in  this  point  of  view,  I 
set  a  value  on  therJi  much  beyond  their  intrinsic  worth." 

Mrs.  Washington's  business  integrity  throughout 
her  life  was  one  of  her  finest  characteristics,  and  in 
her  last  worldly  transaction  she  recorded  the  fact  that 
her  estate  was  encumbered  by  no  debts. 

She  died  as  she  had  lived,  a  grand  character,  one  of 
the  noblest  this  country  ever  has  produced  or  ever  will 
produce. 

Her  grave  was  unmarked,  even  by  a  headstone,  until 
the  year  1833,  when  the  corner-stone  of  a  monument  to 
her  memory  wa^  laid  by  President  Jackson,  in  the 
presence  of  a  great  concourse  of  people.  The  Presi- 
dent was  accom23anied  by  members  of  the  Cabinet  and 
many  citizens  of  Washington.  His  eulogy  on  this 
interesting  occasion  was  a  fitting  one.  The  day,  the 
seventh  of  May,  was  beautiful,  the  soft  sj)ring  air  and 
cloudless  sky  making  it  seem  the  perfection  of  weather. 
The  grave  was  made  near  the  spot  where  she  was  ac- 
customed to  retire  and  pray,  and  it  recalled  the  memo- 
ries of  her  last  years  to  very  many  who  stood  on 
ground  consecrated  by  her  presence.  The  plan  of  the 
monument  was  pyramidal,  and  the  height  of  the 
obelisk  forty- five  feet.  A  colossal  bust  of  Washington 
adorns  the  shaft,  surmounted  by  the  American  eagle 
sustaining  a  civic  crown  above  the  hero's  head.  The 
simjDle  but  eloquent  inscription  it  contains  is : 

Mary, 

the  Mother  of 

Washington. 


46  MARY   WASHINGTON.  , 

Mrs.  L.  N.  Sigoiirney- s  poem  read  on  tlie  occasion  of 
the  laying  of  the  corner-stone  contains  the  following 
touching  lines,  with  which  is  concluded  this  tribute  to 
her  worth  and  her  memory  : 

"  Long  hast  thou  slept  unnoted.     Nature  stole, 
In  her  soft  ministry,  around  thy  bed, 
And  spread  her  vernal  coverings,  violet-gemm'd, 
And  pearl'd  with  dbws.     She  bade  bright  Summer  bring 
Gifts  of  frankincense,  with  sweet  song  of  birds, 
And  Autumn  cast  his  yellow  coronet 
Down  at  thy  feet,  and  stormy  Winter  speak 
Hoarsely  of  man's  neglect.     But  now  we  come 
To  do  thee  homage,  Mother  of  our  Chief, 
Fit  homage,  such  as  honoreth  him  who  pays  ! 
Methinks  we  see  thee,  as  in  olden  time, 
Simple  in  garb — majestic  and  serene— 
Unaw'd  by  "  pomp  and  circumstance" — in  truth 
Inflexible — and  with  Spartan  zeal 
Repressing  vice,  and  making  folly  grave. 
Thou  didst  not  deem  it  woman's  part  to  waste 
Life  in  inglorious  sloth,  to  sport  awhile 
Amid  the  flowers,  or  on  the  summer  wave. 
Then  fleet  like  the  ephemerou  away. 
Building  no  temple  in  her  children's  hearts, 
Save  to  the  vanity  and  pride  of  life 
Which  she  had  worshipped. 

Of  the  might  that  cloth'd 
The  '  Pater  Patria; ' — of  the  deeds  that  won 
A  nation's  liberty  and  earth's  applause, 
Making  Mount  Vernon's  tomb  a  Mecca  haunt 
For  patriot  and  for  sage,  while  time  shall  last. 
What  part  was  thine,  what  thanks  to  thee  are  due, 
Who  'mid  his  elements  of  being  wrought 
With  no  uncertain  aim — nursing  the  germs 


Mary  Washington.  47 

Of  Godlike  virtue  in  his  infant  mind, 
We  hnow  not — Heaven  can  tell ! 

Rise,  noble  pile  ! 
And  show  a  race  unborn  who  rests  below, 
And  say  to  mothers,  what  a  holy  charge 
Is  theirs — with  what  a  kingly  power  their  love 
Might  rule  the  fountains  of  the  new-born  mind  ; 
Warn  them  to  wake  at  early  dawn,  and  sow 
Good  seed  before  the  world  doth  sow  its  tares, 
Nor  in  their  toil  decline — that  angel  bands 
May  put  the  sickle  in,  and  reap  for  God, 
And  gather  to  His  garner." 


THE  MOTHER  OF  MENDELSSOHN. 

Some  of  the  brightest  geniuses  that  have  shed  light 
upon  the  world  in  every  age  have  been  members  of  the 
Jewish  race.  Not  to  mention  the  name  suj^remely 
dear  to  every  Christian  heart,  we  need  only  look  at  the 
illustrious  names  of  poets,  philosophers,  artists,  states- 
men, and  philanthropists  in  recent  times,  to  know  hoAv 
much  the  human  family  is  indebted  to  the  Jew.  The 
history  of  art  and  science,  and  therefore  of  civilization, 
would  be. almost  a  blank  if  the  names  of  illustrious 
Hebrews  were  eliminated. 

In  strange  contrast  with  Beethoven,  whose  life  was 
darkened  by  affliction,  was  Felix  Mendelssohn,  a  master 
in  the  same  art  of  music,  whose  first  name  "  Felix," 
the  happy  one,  was  prophetic  of  the  whole  current  of 
his  life.  His  father  was  a  wealthy  banker,  and  he 
never  knew  an  hour  of  privation  from  the  cradle  to  the 
grave.  Genius  is  sometimes  said  to  be  hereditary,  and 
certainly  it  was  so  in  the  Mendelssohn  family,  although 
the  same  studies  were  not  the  choice  of  all  its  members. 
The  grandfather  of  the  great  musician,  Moses  Mendels- 
sohn, used  to  be  called  "  the  Socrates  of  the  Jews,''  and 
was  a  moral  philosopher  and  metaphysician  of  original 
and  powerful  talent.  Felix,  of  whose  family  and 
especially  of  whose  mother  we  have  now  to  treat,  was 
born  at  Berlin  in  1809.     His  precocity  in  his  special 


LEAH  MENDELSSOHN  BARTHOLDY". 


FELIX   MENDELSSOHN'S   CHARACTER.  51 

gift  Avas  vvonderful.  Before  he  was  eight  years  old  l]e 
read  music  at  sight,  with  a  facility  that  astonished  his 
teachers,  and  in  his  ninth  year  he  i)eriornied  at  a 
public  concert  in  Berlin.  At  twelve  he  comj)osed  a 
pianoforte  quartette  in  C  minor.  He  resided  in  France, 
Italy,  and  England  at  different  times,  and  gave  in 
London  his  first  symphony  and  his  overture  to  the 
"Midsummer  Night's  Dream,"  which  produced  an 
electrical  effect.  When  twenty-three  years  old  lie 
became  director  of  the  theatre  at  Diisseldorf,  where 
in  1835,  Avhen  he  was  twenty-six,  he  performed  his 
great  oratorio  '"  Paulus."  That  and  "  Elijah"  are  his 
greatest  works.  He  died  at  Leipsic,  where  he  was 
musical  director,  in  1847. 

Such  are  the  brief  outlines  of  the  life  of  Felix  Men- 
delssohn. His  character  was  worthy  of  his  happy 
fortune,  for  he  was  full  of  nobility,  goodness,  tender- 
ness, and  delicacy  of  feeling.  His  family  were  only 
less  gifted  than  himself,  and  whether  we  look  at  his 
sisters,  his  father,  or  his  mother,  we  shall  find  them  at 
all  times  worthv  of  him  and  he  of  them.  His -father's 
letters  from  Paris  and  London,  recently  published  for 
the  first  time,  show  that  he  abounded  in  humor, 
shrewdness,  and  the  amusing  gossip  of  the  times  in 
which  he  lived.  His  nephew,  Sebastian  Hensel,  son  of 
liis  elder  sister  Fanny,  collected  and  published  the 
letters  of  Felix  Mendelssohn  w^hich  had  not  previously 
been  given  to  the  iDtiblic,  as  well  as  those  of  his  fatlier 
Abraham,  and  his  mother  Leah,  and  his  tAvo  sisters. 
Those  of  his  father  and  mother  are  especially  cliar- 
acteristic  and  beautiful,  and  as  it  is  our  purpose  to 
speak  especially  of  the  latter  and  her  influence  on  he:- 


52  THE  MOTHER  OF  MENDELSSOHN. 

illustrious  son,  we  will  begin  with  a  brief  sketch  both 
of  the  Mendelssohn  and  Salomon  families,  to  the  latter 
of  which  his  mother  belonged. 

Abraham  Mendelssohn,  the  father  of  Felix,  was  born 
on  the  11th  of  December,  1776,  and  was  the  second 
son  of  the  philosopher  Moses  Mendelssohn,  to  whom 
we  have  already  referred.  One  may  judge  of  his  ex- 
cellent humor  and  kindly  nature,  as  well  as  of  the 
l)ride  he  took  in  the  greatness  of  his  son  Felix,  by  his 
own  words:  "Formerly  I  was  the  son  of  my  father, 
and  now  I  am  the  father  of  my  son."  Little  is  known 
of  his  youth  until  the  year  1803,  when  he  occupied  the 
office  of  cashier  in  the  banking-house  of  the  Messrs. 
Fould,  at  Paris.  Here  he  probably  often  talked  about 
his  futui'e  prospects  with  the  younger  of  his  two 
sisters,  Henrietta,  in  her  cosey  arbor  in  the  Rue  Richer, 
and  in  their  conversation  she  no  doubt  often  mentioned 
her  dearest  and  most  intimate  friend  Leah  Salomon  as 
one  who  would  make  her  brother  happy  if  he  could 
secure  her  as  a  wife.  The  Salomon  family  enjoyed  a 
considerable  social  position  in  Berlin.  Leah's  elder 
brother  had  adoj^ted  the  name  of  Bartholdy,  after  the 
former  proprietor  of  the  garden  belonging  to  the 
Salomon  family.  This  garden,  when  it  afterward  came 
into  the  possession  of  Abraham  Mendelssohn  on  his 
marriage  with  Leah  Salomon,  was  situated  on  the  Spree, 
in  the  K(jpenick  Street,  and  came  in  time  to  be  called 
"the  farm,"  or  the  "  Meiever."  We  mention  these 
apparently  unimportant  facts  to  account  for  Felix 
Mendelssohn  adding  Bartholdy  to  his  own  name. 

Leah  Salomon  is  described  by  those  who  knew  her 
in  her  girlhood  as  not  exactly  handsome,  but  as  pos- 


AN   ACCOMPLISHED    WOMAN.  53 

sessing  eloquent  black  eyes,  a  sylpli-like  figure,  a 
gentle  and  modest  demeanor,  and  possessing  great 
powers  of  conversation,  which  was  distinguished  as 
much  by  sound  judgment  as  by  keen  yet  kindly  wit. 
If  this  description  be  accurate,  it  would  seem  that  the 
English  poet,  Alexander  Pope,  was  not  altogether 
correct  when  he  wrote  that 

"Wit  and  judgment  ever  are  at  strife, 
Though  meant  each  other's  helps,  like  man  and  wife." 

Her  accomplishments  are  also  described  as  quite 
exceptional  for  a  girl  of  her  age.  She  was  familiar 
with  every  branch  of  useful  knowledge,  as  taught  to 
the  youth  of  Germany  in  the  schools.  She  played  and 
sang  mth  grace  and  expression,  although  only  in  the 
presence  of  her  friends.  She  drew  with  exquisite 
skill.  She  spoke  and  read  En^ish,  French,  and 
Italian,  and  she  could  read  "  Homer"  in  the  original 
Greek.  Here  were  certainly  attainments  which  even 
Lady  Jane  Grey,  who  used  to  read  Plato's  "Dia- 
logues" in  Greek  in  her  father's  garden,  might  have 
envied.  An  excellent  trait  of  her  character  was  her 
simplicity  in  dress,  for  although  by  the  legacy  of  a 
relation  she  was  possessed  of  a  considerable  fortune  in 
her  owTi  right,  her  apparel  was  always  as  simple  as  it 
was  elegant,  and  she  allowed  her  mother,  who  was  not 
nearly  so  well  off  as  herself,  a  liberal  income,  and  care- 
fully kept  house  for  her. 

Leah,  or  Lilla  Salomon,  as  she  was  sometimes  called, 
was  born  on  March  26th,  1777.  Some  of  her  letters 
give  abundant  proof  of  her  literary  tastes  and  jDOwers 
of  mind.     After  her  grandfatlier's  death,   when  she 


54  THE  MOTHER  OF   MENDELSSOHN. 

was  twenty-two,  she  writes  to  a  friend,  in  the  midst  of 
a  long  letter  dated  Berlin,  July  2d,  1799  :  "  Under 
these  trees,  i^lanted  and  cultivated  with  real  love  by 
my  dear  grandfather,  I  have  dreamed  the  rosy  dreams 
of  childhood  ;  every  path,  every  spot  is  sacred  and 
interesting  to  me,  in  sweet  remembrance  of  past  times. 
Here  my  feelings  developed  ;  here  my  youthful  mind 
ripened,  and  the  half-slumbering  thoughts  of  my  soul 
took  definite  form  in  this  charming  solitude  ;  here  1 
read  my  favorite  iDoets  with  a  higher  enjoyment ;  here 
I  learned  to  understand  and  appreciate  the  advocates 
of  liberty,  justice,  and  truth  ;  and  I  even  fancy  that 
the  weak  notes  my  unskilled  fingers  produce  are  here 
more  melodious  and  pure.  Thus  my  imagination  sur- 
rounds everything  here  with  higher  splendor,  and  you 
must  pardon  the  enthusiasm  of  a  foolish  girl." 

Abraham  Mendelssohn  seems  to  have  first  met  his 
future  wife  and  to  have  fallen  in  love  with  her  on  a 
journey  from  Paris  to  Berlin.  Her  mother  w^ould  not 
hear,  at  first,  of  her  marrying  a  clerk  in  a  Paris  bank- 
ing-house, and  his  sister  Henrietta  thus  wrote  to  him 
about  his  prospects  :  "I  need  not  tell  you  how  heart- 
ily I  join  in  your  hopes  of  a  happy  result,  but  I  must 
confess  that  it  appears  to  me  nearly  impossible  that 
you  should  succeed  under  your  conditions.  And  yet. 
dear  brother,  this  marriage  would  be  the  greatest  bless- 
ing to  you  in  every  respect,  and  I  cannot  but  entreat 
you  not  to  be  too  hasty,  and  not  to  sacrifice  too  much 
to  your  position,  which,  though  certainly  advantageous 
now,  may  change  in  future  times. 

"  I  feel  as  if  I  were  twenty  years  older  than  you, 
and  could  tell  you  from  my  own  experience  that  at 


LETTER   FROM    HENRIETTA   MENDELSSOHN.  55 

your    age    people    often  raslily  overlook  their    own 
happiness,  even  when  they  find  it  is  in  then-  path  ; 
they  always  expect  everything  exactly  to  suit  their 
own  wishes,  and  then,  while  they  are  hesitating,  their 
happiness  is  gone  and  lost  forever  !     I  hope  to  read  in 
your  next  letter  that  you  have  already  seen  Lilla  ;  and 
the  of tener  you  speak  to  her,  the  more  you  will  observe 
how  seldom,  if  ever,  you  can  find  a  woman  like  her. 
I  do  not  therefore  approve  of  your  dislike  of  Berlin, 
having  so  great  an  influence  on  this  most  important 
decision.     I  could  not  help  charging  you  with  juvenile 
want  of  consideration  when  I  read  in  your  letter,  '  Je 
prefererais  manger  du  i^ain   sec  a  Paris.'     '  Du  pain 
sec '  is  a  very  good  tiling,  especially  here,  where  it  is 
so  white  ;  but  I  always  fear  that  if  you  continue  to 
work  for  others  without  the  means  of  getting  on,  and 
notwithstanding  your  great  talents  are  always  dejDend- 
ent  on  caj^rice  and  obstinacy,  we  know  it  might  be- 
come '  du  pain  amer,'  and  I  pray  God  that  you  may 
not  have  to  repent  afterward  of  your  present  refusal." 
The   allusion   to  her  brother's  preference   for  dry 
bread  in  Paris  to  anything  Berlin  could  offer  him  as  a 
place  of  residence  exjDlains  the  only  obstacle  which 
existed  to  his  immediate  union  with  Leah  Salomon, 
except  her  mother's  objection  to  him  as  being  merely 
a  bank  cashier.     The  letter  of  his  sister,  added  to  his 
own  love  for  Leah,  overcame  his  reluctance  to  throw 
up  his  place  in  Paris,  and  he  forthwith  entered  into 
partnership  with  his  brother  Joseph,  married  the  object 
of  his  affection,  and  the  young  couple  settled  in  Ham- 
burg.    A  letter  from   the  bride    gives    an  animated 
description  of  the  first  days  of  their  married  life. 


'/If  ki 


I.  /iZ/vv  I  ;/*l,  Oft  ih 


//W////M  w/y/,/////'    1    ' 

■.-.,  .„f/ 

...  nr^  I'lm  mol.     iUii>  M 

■'!     ''/    '  III.''.!    '  '/!■  "!     .'/.'      '.'.''       J/''/^/''   ' 

'*  •)inii    //ni  IHf^'  ioht/^  T/   y/ithoui  fit*'  ih<   '> 

"</A>     <ll'    <l/    tiShhtil'      ifi      OUy      (f^U      \Ui\H     \lt,IIH:   ,     /)m5 

i  'y '''''''                                      ^    'unitoi    /•  I 

Iff  If  /)/J   ^/////i                   <.',    ()<i<//*   )«»   /»// 

roofh  i'rr              'Ui\  ih*^'hii^            </ni}^  h**  l/ttlUi  ift'it'i 

wlii^n  W'                          /  tor  ihti  t'onntiy      A  i/Z'^fiy 

/.  I  on  lim  ^^Mtt^ 

t  htutll    Oifi  H^i    iO    UHj  /!/</! 

/  ,(//  h,  ■ '  '///  oi  out  fmi'^hi  t 

ih'iui'jf'i  f(//i, //(/jy  in  oi>t'nih{f  III'/  l)Ml<.'  itOKi  ftont  i'tuin, 
1/  .It  tf^Uii/,  Oh  fn}/  '  .Ui  i\ unman,     ii'ir/nn 

fy '  f/«/(    oiii}/   iU   lo   Uu   ^oih    u\    lUii   iloml    of    thu 

^n,,,■      >  ''  '  '     "■  ■'^'     <<|;    «N//1     intnlh*iii. 

I>4''h''  "   >•  in  •  II' !i<!'  iirHfn        iUti   I  n^f^\llil^Ul 

Ihiii  .utih  '     '         '•  ///()y  iU   for  MImm  /|/^I/« 

'/'"I)  //</r  Iw/j^^  ,  ;//<    )</<-(   ''luififiti  iUhi   lUi  '  h4''ii\i'W 


A   MLTSICAL    CHILD.  57 

is  nothing  but  an  improved  '  Stuart, '  and  that  the 
collar  of  the  Scotch  queen  is  just  as  fashionable  as 
that  of  the  French." 

Abraham  and  Leah  Mendelssohn  lived  in  Hamburg 
till  1811,  and  three  children  were  born  in  that  x>lace — 
Fanny,  the  eldest,  on  November  14th,  1805  ;  Felix  on 
February  3d,  1809,  and  Rebecca  on  April  11th,  1811. 
In  announcing  the  birth  of  Fanny  to  his  wife' s  mother, 
the  father  wrote  :  "  Leah  says  the  child  has  Bach-fugue 
fingers,"  a  prox)hecy  which  proved  to  be  true.  The 
pretty  cottage  with  the  balcony,  on  which  the  hai3py 
bride  had  set  her  heart,  and  which  was  called  Marten' s 
Mill,  had  been  purchased,  and  here  the  young  couple 
spent  the  earlier  years  of  their  exceptionally  happy 
life.  Years  afterward,  in  1833,  when  their  son  Felix 
had  become  famous,  and  was  the  conductor  of  the  great 
Diisseldorf  music  festival,  Abraham  Mendelssohn  wrote 
to  Leah  :  "  Dear  wife,  tliis  young  man  gives  us  much 
joy,  and  I  sometimes  think,  three  cheers  for  Marten's 
Mill !"  Their  last  child,  Paul,  was  born  at  Berlin, 
October  3d,  1813. 

Fanny  and  Felix  Mendelssohn  showed  a  decided 
talent  for  music  even  in  their  early  childhood  ;  they  in- 
herited this  beautiful  gift  from  their  mother,  and  she 
was  their  first  teacher.  The  father' s  method  with  his 
children  was  marked  with  Jewish  strictness,  although 
he  brought  them  up  as  Protestant  Christians.  He 
and  his  brothers  had  remained  Jews  in  religion  when 
their  sisters,  Dorothea  and  Henrietta,  had  embraced 
the  Roman  Catholic  faith.  But  Abraham's  brother- 
in-law  had  already  become  a  Christian,  and  had 
already  adopted  the  surname  of  Bartholdy.     He  wrote 


58  THE   MOTHER   OF   MENDELSSOHN. 

urging  his  sister's  husband  to  follow  his  example, 
and  in  the  fragment  of  a  letter  which  he  wrote  to 
Abraham  he  argues  in  reply  to  the  other's  plea  that 
something  was  due  to  the  memory  of  Moses  Mendels- 
sohn, his  father:  "Do  you  think  that  you  have 
done  anything  wrong  in  giving  your  children  the 
religion  Avhicli  appears  to  you  the  best  ?  It  is  the 
greatest  homage  you  or  any  of  us  could  pay  to  the 
effort  of  your  father  to  promote  true  light  and  knowl- 
edge, and  he  would  have  acted  like  you  for  his  chil- 
dren, and  perhaps  like  me  for  himself.  You  may 
remain  faithful  to  an  oppressed,  persecuted  religion, 
you  may  leave  it  to  your  children  as  a  prospect  of 
life-long  martyrdom,  as  long  as  you  believe  it  to  be 
absolute  truth.  But  when  you  have  ceased  to  believe 
that,  it  is  barbarism.  I  advise  you  also  to  adopt 
the  name  of  Mendelssohn  Bartholdy  as  a  distinc- 
tion from  the  other  Mendelssohns.  At  the  same 
time  you  would  please  me  very  much,  because  it 
would  be  the  means  of  preserving  my  memory  in  the 
family."  So  it  came  to  pass  that  Abraham  and  Leah 
Mendelssohn  took  the  additional  name  of  Bartholdy. 
In  writing  to  his  children,  he  says  in  1817:  "About 
you,  my  dear  Felix,  your  mother  writes  as  yet  with 
satisfaction,  and  I  am  very  glad  of  it,  and  hope  to 
find  a  faithful  and  pleasing  diary.  Mind  my  maxim, 
'True  and  obedient.'"  And  to  little  Paul:  "Your 
letter,  my  dear  little  king  of  the  Moors,  also  called 
Paul  Hermann,  was  the  best  of  all,  without  a  single 
mistake,  and  beautifully  short.  I  praise  you  in 
good  earnest  for  your  conduct,  of  which  mother, 
Rebecca,  and  Fanny  give  such  a  charming  account." 


ABRAHAM  TO  HIS  DAUGHTER.  59 

And  some  months  later  to  Fanny:  "Above  all,  let 
there  be  more  and  more  strengthening  of  your  en- 
deavor to  please  your  loving  and  revered  mother,  and 
to  arrive  through  obedience  at  love,  through  order 
and  discipline  at  freedom  and  happiness.  That  is  the 
best  way  of  thanking  and  worshipping  the  Creator, 
the  Maker  of  us  all.  There  are  in  all  religions  only 
one  God,  one  virtue,  one  truth,  one  happiness. 
You  will  find  all  this,  if  you  follow  the  voice  of  your 
heart.  Live  so  that  it  be  ever  in  harmony  with  the 
voice  of  your  reason.  You  know  from  my  letters  to 
mother  how  I  get  on.  Daily  and  hourly  do  I  think 
of  you  with  true  affection."  He  tells  her  in  another 
letter  not  to  mind  growing  stout:  "  It  is  one  resem- 
blance to  your  mother,  and  you  can  never  be  enough 
like  her,  for  there  is  not  her  superior."  Still  more 
impressively  does  he  write  to  her,  his  eldest  child, 
after  her  confirmation  in  the  Lutheran  Church  in  1820  : 

"My  DEAR  Daughter:  You  have  taken  an  impor- 
tant step,  and  in  sending  you  my  best  wishes  for  the 
day  and  for  your  future  happiness,  I  have  it  at  heart 
to  speak  seriously  to  you  on  subjects  hitherto  not 
touched  upon.  Does  God  exist  ?  What  is  God  ?  Is 
He  a  part  of  ourselves,  and  does  He  continue  to  live 
after  the  other  part  has  ceased  to  be  ?  And  where '. 
And  how  ?  All  this  I  do  not  know,  and  therefore  have 
never  taught  you  anything  about  it.  But  I  know 
that  there  exists  in  me  and  in  you  and  in  all  human 
beings  an  everlasting  inclination  toward  all  that  is 
good,  true,  and  right,  and  a  conscience  which  warns 
and  guides  us  when  we  are  going  astray,     I  know  it, 


60  THE   MOTHER   OF   MENDELSSOHN. 

I  believe  it,  I  live  in  this  faith,  and  this  is  my  re- 
ligion. .  .  .  The  example  of  your  mother,  the  best 
and  noblest  of  mothers,  whose  whole  life  is  devotion, 
love,  and  charity,  is  like  a  bond  to  me  that  yon  will 
not  cast  it  away.  You  have  grown  up  under  her 
guidance,  ever  intuitively  receiving  and  adopting 
what  alone  gives  real  worth  to  mankind.  Your  mother 
has  been,  and  is,  and  I  trust  will  long  remain  to  you, 
to  your  sister  and  brothers,  and  to  all  of  us,  a  prov- 
idential leading  star  on  our  path  of  life.  When  you 
look  at  her  and  turn  over  in  your  thoughts  all  the 
unmeasurable  good  she  has  lavished  upon  you 
by  her  constant  self-sacrificing  devotion  as  long 
as  you  live,  and  when  that  reflection  makes  your, heart 
and  eyes  overflow  with  gratitude,  love,  and  veneration, 
then  you  feel  God  and  are  godly. 

"This  is  all  I  can  tell  you  about  religion,  all  I 
know  about  it;  but  this  will  remain  true  as  long  as 
one  man  will  exist  in  the  creation,  as  it  has  been  true 
since  the  first  man  was  created'. 

"The  outward  form  of  religion  your  teacher  has 
given  you  is  historical,  and  changeable  like  all  human 
ordinances.  Some  thousands  of  years  ago  the  Jewish 
form  was  the  reigning  one,  then  the  heathen  form, 
and  now  it  is  the  Christian.  We,  your  mother  and  I, 
were  born  and  brought  up  by  our  parents  as  Jews, 
and  without  being  obliged  to  change  tlie  form  of  our 
religion,  have  been  able  to  follow  the  divine  instinct 
in  us  and  in  our  conscience.  We  have  educated  you 
and  your  brother  in  the  Christian  faith  because  it  is 
the  faith  of  most  civilized  people,  and  contains  noth- 
ing that  can  lead  you  away  from*  what  is  good,  and 


A   HEBREW    PARENT'S   VIEW.  61 

much  that  guides  you  to  love,  obedience,  tolerance, 
and  resignation,  even  if  it  offered  nothing  but  the  ex- 
ample of  its  Founder,  understood  by  so  few,  and 
followed  bv  still  fewer. 

"  By  pronouncing  your  confession  of  faith  you  have 
fulfilled  the  claims  of  society  on  you,  and  obtained 
the  name  of  a  Christian.  Now  be  what  your  duty  as 
a  human  being  demands  of  you — true,  faithful,  good, 
obedient,  and  devoted  till  death  to  jour  mother,  and  I 
may  say  also  to  your  father,  unremittingly  attentive  to 
the  voice  o,f  your  conscience,  which  may  be  suppressed 
but  never  silenced — and  you  will  gain  the  highest 
happiness  that  is  to  be  found  on  earth,  harmony,  and 
contentedness  with  yourself. 

"  I  embrace  you  with  fatherly  tenderness,  and  hope 
always  to  find  in  you  a  daughter  worthy  of  your 
mother.     Farewell,  and  remember  my  words." 

We  have  quoted  this  letter  in  full  because  it  ex- 
plains the  views  which  these  Hebrew  parents  of  the 
noblest  type  took  of  religion.  To  those  who  confound 
form  with  spirit,  it  may  appear  wrong  for  them  to  have 
reared  their  children  in  the  Christian  faith  while  they 
themselves  were  Jews.  But  they  regarded  creeds  and 
churches  in  a  rational,  not  a  dogmatic  light.  Their 
views  may  be  illustrated  by  the  couplet  of  Alexander 
Pope,  w^ho  was  a  Roman  Catholic  : 

"  For  modes  of  faith  let  graceless  zealots  fight ; 
His  can't  be  wrong  whose  life  is  in  the  right." 

We  see,  at  all  events,  both  in  this  letter  and  in  the 
brief  extracts  we  have  given  from  the  preceding  ones, 


62  THE   MOTHER   OF   MENDELSSOHN. 

liow  admirable  were  the  precei:)ts  wliicli  their  noble 
parents  instilled  into  their  children,  and  the  reverence 
and  affection  which  this  Hebrew  Inisband  jiays  to  his 
wife — "  mother,"  as  he  familiarly  speaks  of  her.  It  is 
a  sacred  name,  and  what  a  mother  must  she  have  been 
who  could  call  forth  such  a  eulogy  from  her  husband  as 
this  :  "The  best  and  noblest  of  mothers,  whose  whole 
life  is  devotion,  charity,  and  love." 

One  writer,  in  speaking  of  her,  says  : 

"  She  was  musical,  but  not  in  the  eminent  degree  of 
her  two  elder  children ;  yet  she  was  Fanny' s  eldest 
teacher,  and  conducted  her  through  the  most  difficult 
studies  of  Bach,  so  that  when  a  mere  child  she  was  able 
to  play  from  memory  not  only  vast  quantities  of  Beet- 
hoven's  and  Mozart's  music,  but  twenty-four  of  Bach's 
fugues.  .  .  .  She  was  a  lady  of  romantic  tempera- 
ment, quite  unlike  her  methodical  and  austere  hus- 
band. .  .  .  Her  one  weakness  appears  to  have 
been  excessive  nervous  excitability,  leading  at  times 
to  peevishness  and  to  unreasonable  demands  ;  but  as  a 
rule  she  held  herself  well  in  hand,  and  was  a  spring  of 
delight  to  her  household  and  friends." 

Another  writer,  in  speaking  of  her,  has  said : 

"There  have  lived  few  women  more  honorably  dis- 
tinguished than  she  was  by  acquirement ;  by  that  per- 
fect propriety  which  Horace  Walpole  has  justly  called 
the  grace  of  declining  life  ;  by  a  cordial  hospitality,  the 
sincerity  of  which  there  was  no  mistaking  ;  by  an  easy 
humor  in  conversation,  a  knowledge  of  men  and  books, 
and  a  lively  interest  in  the  younger  generation,  which 
at  her  age  is  only  found  in  the  brightest  and  best  of 
their  species.     It  is  true  that  she  had  no  common  mo- 


A    CHRISTMAS   REUNION.  (J3 

tive  for  keeping  pace  with  the  world  of  Europe  in  the 
fame  of  her  son,  and  in  the  brilliant  succession  of 
guests  whom  her  daughter  assembled  ;  but  apart  from 
this  she  possessed  a  fund  of  intelligence,  a  mind 
bred  amid  constant  intercourse  with  the  best  things 
and  persons  of  all  countries,  which  belonged  to  herself 
and  remained  with  her  to  the  last." 

The  remaining  years  of  Leah  Mendelssohn' s  bright 
and  beautiful  life  were  passed,  like  the  earlier  ones,  in 
making  herself  useful  and  others  happy.  In  the  career 
of  her  son  Felix  she  always  exhibited  the  tenderest 
interest,  and  their  affectionate  and  intellectual  relations 
with  each  other  were  never  broken  or  saddened  till  her 
death  put  an  end  to  them.  He  was  looking  forward  to 
a  happy  meeting  in  the  December  of  1842,  and  had  ap- 
pointed to  be  at  Berlin  on  the  17th,  but  an  unlooked- 
for  affliction  summoned  him  at  an  earlier  date.  His 
mother  had  latterly  been  remarkably  well  in  health, 
and  in  more  than  usually  good  spiiits.  She  entered 
with  greater  eagerness  than  usual  into  all  the  prepara- 
tions for  Christmas,  and  no  one  who  saw  her  pursuing 
the  even  tenor  of  her  life  from  day  to  day,  always 
calm,  always  happy,  could  dream  of  any  approaching 
danger.  There  was  indeed  not  the  slightest  sign  of  the 
end.  On  Sunday,  December  lltli,  some  friends  in  ad- 
dition to  the  family,  who  always  dined  with  her  on  that 
day,  liad  been  invited  to  dinner.  The  -party  was  a 
merry  one,  and  she  entered  into  all  the  fun  and  laugh- 
ter, extracting  a  promise  fi'om  her  guests  that  they 
would  spend  the  next  ten  Christmases  with  her. 

In  the  evening  a  party   of  friends  more  numerous 
than  usual  gathered  in  the  drawing-room,  but  in  the 


64  THE   MOTHER   OF   MENDELSSOHN. 

midst  of  a  lively  conversation  she  was  taken  ill,  and 
had  to  be  carried  to  bed. 

After  a  time  she  fell  asleep  in  her  habitual  position, 
seeming  quite  comfortable,  even  her  hands  being 
warm,  and  her  children  could  not  conceive  that  they 
•were  standing  by  their  mother's  death-bed.  This 
lasted  until  half-past  nine  on  Monday  morning,  De- 
cember 12th,  when  there  was  a  short  struggle,  and  all 
was  over. 

"Thus,"  says  her  grandson,  "another  full  and 
happy  life  was  cut  short  by  a  sudden,  almost  painless 
death,  without  any  preceding  illness."  Her  daughter 
Fanny,  the  eldest  of  her  children,  writes  in  her  diary  : 
' '  A  more  happy  end  could  not  have  been  desired  for 
her.  She  was  taken  literally  as  she  told  Albertine  last 
summer  she  should  like  to  be,  knowing  nothing  about 
it  and  without  being  laid  up,  but  engaged  to  the  last 
in  the  ordinary  course  of  her  pleasant  daily  life,  and 
in  the  full  enjoyment  of  her  intellectual  faculties." 
Shortly  afterward,  Felix  Mendelssohn,  writing  to  his 
brother  Paul,  said  that  they  ' '  were  all  well,  and  living 
on  their  sorrow  as  they  best  could,  dwelling  on  the 
happiness  they  once  possessed."  The  mother  had 
been  literally  the  centre  of  the  family  circle,  and  al- 
though her  four  children  did  not  need  her  to  keep  up 
their  affection,  they  felt  the  loss  of  this  rallying-point 
in  many  minor  but  important  incidents  of  daily  life. 
"She,"  says  her  grandson,  Sebastian  Hensel,  "was 
the  natural  head  round  whom  the  others  fell  into  their 
own  places  as  a  matter  of  course.  The  members  of  the 
family  dined  every  Sunday  with  her  ;  the  Christmas- 
eve  gathering  took  place,  year  after  year,  at  her  liouse  ; 


DEATH   OF   THE   MOTHER.  65 

Felix,  when  he  came  to  Berlin,  was,  as  a  rule,  her 
guest.  Now  the  brothers  and  sisters  were  forced  to 
make  fresh  arrangements,  and  they  all  felt  the  change 
acutely."  So  it  was  that  Felix,  in  his  letter  to  his 
younger  brotlier  Paul  after  her  death,  says  :  "  My  letter 
was  addressed  to  Fanny,  but  written  to  you  all,  though 
it  seems  you  had  not  heard  of  it ;  and  even  this  trifle 
shows  what  will  day  by  day  be  more  deeply  and  pain- 
fully felt  by  us,  that  the  point  of  union  is  now  gone 
where  we  could  always  feel  ourselves  still  to  be  chil- 
dren, and  though  we  were  no  longer  so  in  years,  we 
fel't  that  we  were  still  so  in  feeling.  When  I  wrote  to 
my  mother  I  knew  that  I  wrote  to  you  all,  and  you 
knew  it  too  ;  we  are  children  no  longer,  but  we  have 
enjoyed  what  it  really  was  to  be  so.  Now  this  is  gone 
forever !  At  such  a  time  we  cling  to  outward  things 
from  hour  to  hour,  like  people  in  a  dark  room  groping 
to  find  the  way." 

The  following  obituary  notice  appeared  in  the  lead- 
ing Berlin  paper  on  the  evening  of  the  day  of  her 
death : 

"  LEAH   SALOMON.       A   PORTRAIT. 

"  Berlin  has  lost  to-day  one  of  its  most  eminent  inhab- 
itants. Leah  Salomon,  the  widow  of  Town-Councillor 
Mendelssohn-Bartholdy,  and  mother  of  the  King's 
Kapellmeister,  Felix  Mendelssohn  Bartholdy,  died  this 
morning  from  an  attack  of  spasm  of  the  lungs,  with 
which  she  was  seized  on  the  previous  evening.  En- 
dowed with  rare  qualities  of  head  and  of  heart,  she  was 
high-minded  and  affectionate  to  a  degree,  and  fulfilled 
all  the  duties  of  a  loving  wife  and  devoted  mother. 


66  THE   MOTHER   OF   MENDELSSOHN. 

Her  benevolence  exercised  in  secret,  invariably  guided 
by  sound  common-sense,  made  itself  felt  far  and  wide. 
The  sweetness  of  lier  character  did  not  exclude  firm- 
ness, and  in  times  of  difficulty  and  danger,  when  her 
husband  showed  himself  a  patriot  of  faith  and  pa- 
tience, her  courage  equalled  his.  Her  death  will  be 
deplored,  not  only  by  her  gifted  children  and  near  re- 
lations, but  by  a  large  circle  of  friends  and  acquaint- 
ances, for  she  had  gathered  around  her  a  society  as 
select  as  it  was  brilliant,  and  as  sociable  as  it  was  ani- 
mated. It  was  while  engaged  in  conversation,  friendly 
and  intellectual  as  hers  always  was,  that  she  was 
suddenly  called  away.  Her  memory  will  be  cherished 
by  all  who  knew  her.  and  handed  down  to  future 
ages." 


THE  MOTHER  OF   NAPOLEON. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  NAPOLEON. 

Ramolii^o  Marie  Letitia,  the  mother  of  Napoleon, 
was  bom  at  Ajaccio  on  the  24th  of  August,  1750.  She 
was  married  to  Charles  Bonaparte  before  she  had 
completed  her  sixteenth  year.  Her  beauty  made  her 
an  object  of  admiration  when  a  mere  child,  and  she 
retained  it  to  extreme  old  age,  dying  when  nearly  in 
her  eightieth  year.  The  bust  taken  of  her  in  the 
evening  of  her  life  at  Rome,  by  the  great  Italian 
sculptor  Canova,  reveals  a  classic  beauty  and  regu- 
larity of  feature  which  recalls  the  profile  of  her  ex- 
traordinary son,  and  indicates  the  possession  of  the 
same  qualities,  otherwise  applied,  as  those  that  made 
him  the  a-reatest  commander  and  ruler  of  men  of  his 
own  and  perhaps  of  any  age.  Dauntless  courage, 
strength  of  will,  foresight,  fiexibility  to  circumstances, 
and  the  adaptation  of  means  to  ends,  added  to  a  sense 
of  duty  and  a  recognition  of  higher  principles  of 
conduct  than  her  son  possessed,  are  what  chiefly  strike 
the  observer  in  her  face.  Her  complexion  was  very 
pale,  and  became  more  than  usually  so  when  excited, 
and  on  such  occasions  her  eyes  seemed  to  open  wider, 
her  lips  became  closely  set,  and  her  whole  countenance 
had  a  rapt  and  prophetic  aspect. 

The  Duchess  d'Abrantes,  who  describes  her  as  one 
of  the  most  beautiful  young  women  in  Corsica,  says 
that  "  her  soul  beamed  in  her  looks,  and  it  was  a  soul 


70  THE   MOTHER   OF   NAPOLEON. 

full  of  the  loftiest  sentiments."  Napoleon  himself 
did  full  justice  to  the  heroic  character  of  his  mother. 
"  I  had  need,"  he  says,  referring  to  his  boyhood,  "to 
be  on  the  alert ;  our  mother  would  have  repressed  my 
warlike  humor  ;  she  would  not  have  put  up  with  my 
caprices.  Her  tenderness  was  joined  with  severity  : 
she  i)unislied,  rewarded,  all  alike  ;  the  good,  the  bad, 
nothing  escaped  her  ....  she  did  indeed  watch  over 
us  with  a  solicitude  unexampled.  Every  low  senti- 
ment, every  ungenerous  affection  was  discarded,  dis- 
couraged ;  she  suffered  nothing  but  what  was  grand 
and  elevated  to  take  root  in  our  youthful  understand- 
ings. She  abhorred  falsehood,  was  provoked  by  dis- 
obedience ;  she  passed  over  none  of  our  faults."  And 
when  describing  the  death  of  an  uncle  upon  whom, 
after  Charles  Bonaparte's  death,  the  family  were 
partly  dependent,  he  says  :  "  He  then  made  us  draw 
near,  and  gave  us  his  blessing  and  advice.  '  You  are 
the  eldest  of  the  family,'  he  said  to  Joseph  ;  '  but 
Napoleon  is  the  head  of  it.  Take  care  to  remember 
what  I  say  to  you.'  He  then  expired,  amid  the  sobs 
and  tears  wliich  this  melancholy  sight  di^ew  from  us. 
Left  without  guide,  without  support,  my  mother  was 
obliged  to  take  the  direction  of  affairs  nxDon  herself. 
But  the  tas|v  was  not  above  her  strength  ;  she  managed 
everything,  provided  for  everything,  with  a  prudence 
and  sagacity  which  could  neither  have  been  expected 
from  her  sex  nor  from  her  age.  Oh,  what  a  woman  ! 
— where  look  for  her  equal !" 

Napoleon  was  not  the  only  great  man  who  has  been 
born  amid  peril  and  privation.  The  Duchess  d'  Abran- 
tes  gives  an  account  of  his  birth  in  her  interesting 


YOUTHFUL    REMINISCENCES.  71 

journal  about  the  persons  and  events  connected  with 
the  court  and  camp  of  Bonaparte.  She  was  the  wife  of 
his  comrade  Junot,  whom  he  made  a  duke,  and  the 
Emperor  was  godfather  to  her  child.  She  and  her 
mother  had  frequent  and  intimate  conversations  with 
the  mother  of  Napoleon — Madame  Mere  as  she  calls 
her — at  a  later  time.  One  day  in  particular  she  records 
the  strong  impression  she  received  of  the  maternal 
heroism  of  Letitia  Bonaparte.  "  We  had  no  other 
company,  and  she  conversed  for  hours  with  my  mother 
with  greater  freedom  than  she  had  yet  done  since  her 
arrival  from  Corsica.  They  began  both  of  them  to 
recall  the  days  of  their  youth.  Madame  Bonaparte 
was  quite  at  ease,  because  with  us  she  spoke  nothing 
but  Italian.  I  recollect  she  this  day  told  us,  that 
being  at  mass  on  the  day  of  the  fete  of  Notre  Dame, 
of  August,  she  was  overtaken  with  the  pains  of  child- 
birth, and  she  had  hardly  reached  home  when  she 
was  delivered  of  Napoleon  on  a  wretched  rug.  Pre- 
vious to  his  birth  she  had  experienced  many  mis- 
fortunes ;  for  when  the  French  entered  Corsica  many 
of  the  principal  families,  and  among  them  that  of 
Bonaparte,  were  compelled  to  fly.  '  They  assembled  at 
the  foot  of  Monte  Rotondo,  the  highest  mountain  in 
Corsica.  In  their  flight  and  during  their  sojourn 
among  the  mountains  they  underwent  many  hard- 
ships. ' ' 

Napoleon  was  born  on  the  15th  of  Augast,  1769. 
The  Bonaparte  family  had  been  distinguished  in  the 
middle  ages  in  Italy,  whence  his  branch  of  it  removed 
to  Corsica,  at  the  time  of  the  struggle  between  the 
Guelphs  and  Ghibellines.     They  belonged  to  the  gen- 


72  THE   MOTHER   OF  NAPOLEON. 

try  of  the  island.  Charles  Bonaparte,  Napoleon's 
father,  was  an  advocate  of  local  reputation,  and  when 
the  Corsicans  nnder  Paoli  were  struggling  against  the 
domination  of  the  French,  he  espoused  the  i3opular 
side.  He  afterward  made  his  peace  with  the  French, 
and  Napoleon  was  born  two  months  after  their  con- 
quest of  Corsica.  He  was  their  second  child.  Joseph, 
afterward  King  of  Spain,  was  the  eldest,  and  he  had 
three  younger  brothers,  Lucien,  Louis,  and  Jerome, 
and  three  sisters,  Eliza,  Caroline,  and  Pauline.  These 
grew  up,  but  five  others  must  have  died  in  infancy,  for 
we  are  told  that  Letitia  had  given  birth  to  thuteen 
children  when,  at  the  age  of  thirty-five,  she  became  a 
widow.  Her  husband  became  reconciled  to  the  French 
conquerors  of  the  island,  and  the  French  governor,  the 
Count  de  Marboeuf,  became  his  friend  and  protector. 

The  breath  of  scandal  is  ever  ready  to  sully  the 
reputation  of  a  beautiful  woman.  Letitia  Bonaparte 
did  not  escape  it,  and  it  was  rumored  that  Governor 
Marboeuf  was  her  lover  ;  some  even  went  so  far  as  to 
hint  that  he  was  the  father  of  the  future  Emperor. 
Napoleon,  in  his  earlier  days,  is  said  not  to  have  been 
careful  of  his  mother's  good  name,  but  he  lived  to  do 
her  justice  in  deed  and  word.  In  Ajaccio  itself  the 
scandal  of  illicit  love  between  the  governor  of  Corsica 
and  the  mother  of  Napoleon  was  not  believed,  but  it 
was  easy  enough  for  gossip  to  assign  a  dishonorable 
motive  for  the  kindness  which  the  Count  de  Marboeuf 
showed  to  the  family.  It  was  through  him  that 
Charles  Bonaparte  received  the  government  appoint- 
ment of  Procureur  du  Boi,  an  office  equivalent  to 
Attorney-General  for  Corsica.      It  was  through  him 


NAPOLEON'S  LETTER  TO  PAOLI.  73 

also  that  Cliaiies  and  Letitia  Bonaparte  obtained 
scholarships  for  their  sons  in  some  of  the  principal 
schools  in  France. 

While  the  patient  endurance  and  unflinching  forti- 
tude of  his  ^mother  in  the  months  preceding  his  birth, 
during  \Yhich  she  shared  the  perils  of  war  with  her 
husband,  demonstrate  her  remarkable  self-possession, 
the  same  circumstances  developed,  no  doubt,  the  con- 
centrated and  resolute  character  of  her  illustrious  son. 
"  I  was  born,"  wrote  Napoleon  to  Paoli  in  1789, 
"when  my  country  was  sinking;  the  cries  of  the 
dying,  the  groans  of  the  ojopressed,  and  the  tears  of 
despair  surrounded  my  cradle  from  my  bhth."  "  Like 
the  infant  Achilles,"  says  the  French  historian  Lanfrey, 
"  he  had  been  dipped  in  the  Styx."  Such  experiences 
in  childhood  made  him  prematurely  serious,  and  his 
favorite  reading  was  of  heroes  and  battles.  "  Caesar's 
Commentaries"  and  "  Plutarch's  Lives"  were  his  con- 
stant companions  in  leisure  hours.  When  a  mere  boy 
he  brooded  over  the  troubles  of  Corsica,  and  became 
misanthropic.  "  How  depraved  men  are !"  he  ex- 
claims at  the  age  of  sixteen;  "what  cowardly,  cring- 
ing wretches  they  are  !  What  a  spectacle  my  country 
presents  !  The  trembling  inhabitants  clasp  the  hand 
that  oppresses  them.  They  are  no  longer  the  brave 
Corsicans  whom  a  hero  inspired  with  his  love  of  virtue 
and  Ms  hatred  of  tyranny,  of  luxury,  of  base  cour- 
tiers. .  .  .  Frenchmen,  not  satisfied  with  depriving 
us  of  all  we  most  prize,  you  have  also  corrupted  our 
manners.  .  .  .  Life  is  a  burden  to  me,  for  I  enter  into 
none  of  its  pleasures,  and  everything  is  a  toil,  because 
the  men  -with  whom  I  live,  and  probably  shall  always 


74  THE   MOTHER  OF   NAPOLEON. 

have  to  live,  liave  tastes  which  differ  as  miich  from 
mine  as  the  light  of  the  moon  does  from  that  of  the 
sun.     I  cannot  live  in  such  a  manner  as  alone  would 
make  existence  endurable,  so  I  am  full  of  disgust  for 
everything."     Here,  surely,  we  have  premonitions  of 
that  "vaulting   ambition  which   o'erleaps  itself  and 
falls  on  the    other  side  !"      But  Napoleon's  master 
principle  through  life  was  self-interest,  and  although 
he  is  reported  when  a  boy  even  at  the  school  at  Brienne 
to  have  denounced  his  father  before  his  school-fellows 
for  submitting  to  the  French  conquerors  of  Corsica, 
and  to  have  lauded  Paoli  to  the  skies,  yet  when  Paoli 
asked  for  his  services  against  the  French  at  a  later  day 
he  refused  them,  and  enlisted  under  the  French  com- 
mander, knowing  that  this  was  then  the  winning  side. 
We  have   seen  Xapoleon   compared,  for  his  early 
baptism  in  conflict,  with  Achilles  dipped  as  an  infant 
in  the   Styx,   according  to   fable.     The  reference  to 
Achilles  recalls  to  mind  the  tradition  that  when  Napo- 
leon was  born  the  only  covering  of  his  mother  was' a 
tapestry  on  which  the  heroes  of  Homer  s  "  Iliad  "  Avere 
depicted.     This  seems  prophetic   and  appropriate  at 
the  birth  of  a  hero  who  was  one  day  to  be  a  second 
Charlemagne  and  master  of  half  of  Europe.     Accord- 
ing to  Humboldt,  when  the  population  of  all  Europe 
was  one  hundi^ed  and  eighty- two  millions,  Napoleon 
had  eighty-five  millions  under  his  domination  :   his 
control  extended  over  nineteen  degrees  of  latitude  and 
thuty  of  longitude.     He  was  able  to  make  kings  of  his 
brothers,   but  his  mother  showed  her  prudence  and 
foresight  when,  on  being  asked  why  she  was  so  econo- 
mical and  saving  in  the  midst  of  imperial  affluence  and 


THE   SUMMER  HOME.  75 

splendor,  she  humbly  answered,  "  Who  knows  but  that 
some  day  these  kings  may  have  to  come  to  me  for 
bread?" 

Sir  Walter  Scott  has  left  a  descrix)tion  of  the  summer 
resort  of  Madame  Charles  Bonajparte  and  her  children, 
which  seems  to  have  been  a  peaceful  retreat  for  them. 
"  Going  along  the  seashore. from  Ajaccio  toward  the  Isle 
Sanguiniere,  about  a  mile  from  the  town,  occur  two 
stone  pillars,  the  remains  of  a  doorway  leading  up  to 
a  dilapidated  villa,  once  the  residence  of  Madame 
Bonaparte's  half-brother  on  the  mother's  side,  whom 
Xapoleon  created  Cardinal  Fesch.  The  house  is  ap- 
proached by  an  avenue  surrounded  and  overhung  by 
the  cactus  and  other  shrubs,  which  luxuriate  in  a 
Avarm  climate.  It  has  a  garden  and  a  lawn,  showing, 
amid  neglect,  vestiges  of  their  former  beauty,  and  the 
house  is  surrounded  by  shrubberies  now  permitted  to 
run  to  \vildness.  This  was  the  summer  residence  of 
Madame  Bonaioarte  and  her  family.  Almost  inclosed 
by  the  wild  olive,  the  cactus,  the  clematis,  and  the 
almond  tree,  is  a  very  singular  and  isolated  granite 
rock,  called  Xapoleon's  Grotto,  which  seems  to  have 
resisted  the  decomposition  which  has  taken  place 
around.  The  remains  of  a  small  summer-house  are 
visible  beneath  the  rock,  the  entrance  to  which  is  near- 
ly closed  by  a  luxuriant  fig-tree.  This  was  Bonaparte's 
frequent  retreat,  when  the  vacations  of  the  school  at 
which  he  studied  permitted  him  to  visit  home.  How 
the  imagination  labors  to  form  an  idea  of  the  visions 
which  in  this  sequestered  and  romantic  spot  must  have 
arisen  before  the  eyes  of  the  hero  of  a  hundred  battles  !" 

They  were  to  be  rudely  driven  from  this  retreat  as 


76  THE   MOTHER   OF   NAPOLEON. 

well  as  from  Corsica.  In  1793,  when  Charles  Bona- 
parte had  been  eight  years  dead  of  the  painful  disease 
which  was  to  kill  Napoleon  at  St.  Helena  (cancer  of 
the  stomach),  disturbances  rent  the  island.  The  Bona- 
parte family  adhered  to  the  French,  but  Paoli,  who 
had  returned  from  his  previous  exile,  wished  to  sur- 
render Corsica  to  the  English.  Several  thousand  peas- 
ants made  a  descent  from  the  mountains  on  Ajaccio. 
The  house  of  Madame  Bonaparte  was  pillaged,  and  the 
flocks  and  vineyards  destroyed.  Napoleon,  who  Avas 
on  a  visit  from  France  to  his  mother,  as  well  as  his 
brothers  Josei)h  and  Lucien,  were  subjected  to  a  decree 
of  banishment  from  their  native  Corsica.  Under  the 
protection  of  these  three  sons,  Letitia  Bonaparte  set 
sail  with  Jerome,  as  yet  a  chUd,  and  her  three 
daughters  for  Italy.  They  settled  for  a  time  at  Nice, 
but  afterward  removed  to  Marseilles,  where  they 
suffered  the  severest  privations. 

The  events  of  the  18th  Brumaire,  the  9th  of  Novem- 
ber, 1799,  when  Napoleon  by  military  force  put  an  end 
to  the  Directory  and  became  First  Consul,  which  in 
fact  meant  Dictator  or  President  of  France,  are  famil- 
iar to  all  students  of  modern  history.  Six  years  had 
now  elapsed  since  Madame  Bonaparte  and  her  children 
had  quitted  Corsica.  She  was  now  to  be  raised  from 
privation  and  to  participate  in  the  elevation  of  her  son. 
"  Upon  the  first  flush  of  good  fortune,""  says  Madame 
Junot,  as  the  Duchess  d'Abrantes  then  was,  "  Napo- 
leon, whose  attachment  to  his  mother  Avas  ever  con- 
spicuous, did  not  fail  to  assign  a  portion  of  his  gains  to 
the  use  of  Madame  Letitia,  wlio  thus  found  herself 
raised  on  a  sudden  from   a  state  of  comi)arative  in- 


MADAME   MERE   INDIGNANT.  77 

digence  to  one  of  ease  and  comfort.  Shortly  after  the 
Revolution  of  1799,  by  which  Napoleon  was  placed  at 
the  head  of  the  consular  government,  Madame  Bona- 
parte removed  with  her  children  to  Paris,  where  she 
lived  in  tlie  most  retired  manner,  nor  was  it  until  1804, 
Avhen  her  son  was  proclaimed  Emperor,  that  j^ublic 
attention  Avas  directed  toward  her.  She  then  received 
the  title  of  Madame  Mere,  and  had  an  income  of  a 
million  francs  settled  upon  her,  and  in  order  to  invest 
her  with  a  position  of  political  importance,  she  was 
made  Protectrice  Generale  of  a]l  the  charitable  insti- 
tutions of  France — an  office  well  befitting  the  mother 
of  the  sovereign.  Napoleon  used  to  say  of  her  that 
she  had  the  head  of  a  man  on  the  shoulders  of  a 
woman,  and 'on  many  occasions  she  showed  her  resolute 
spirit  and  a  proud  consciousness  of  what  was  due  to 
her  as  his  mother.  Shortly  after  he  became  Emperor, 
he  happened  to  meet  her  in  the  gardens  of  St.  Cloud, 
and  half  in  jest,  half  seriously,  he  offered  her  his  hand 
to  kiss.  She  flung  it  from  her  with  indignation,  and 
exclaimed  in  the  presence  of  his  officers,  "  It  is  vour 
duty  to  kiss  the  hand  of  her  who  gave  you  life  !" 

She  never  forgot  for  a  moment  the  bitter  experience 
of  the  past,  and  even  her  parsimonious  habits  resulted 
from  the  apprehension  of  future  reverses  to  her  familv. 
"Madame  Mere,"  says  the  wife  of  Marshal  Junot, 
afterward  created  Duke  d'Abrantes,  "had  often  talked 
over  these  events  before,  but  the  recital  never  interested 
me  so  powerfully  as  on  the  8th  of  November,  when 
the  space  of  six  years  had  rendered  so  different  the 
situation  of  those  very  children  whom  she,  a  lone, 
feeble  woman,  had  been  forced  to  hurry  away  beyond 


78  THE   MOTHER   OF   NAPOLEON. 

the  reach  of  the  proscription,  carrying  the  yonngest  in 
her  arms,  when  overcome  with  fatigiie  they  could  no 
longer  walk,  and  ultimately  embarking  with  them  in  a 
frail  vessel  and  landing  on  a  shore  which  increased 
their  dangers.  In  recording  this  period  of  her  life,  the 
looks  of  Madame"  Bonaparte  were  as  beautiful  as  her 
language  was  eloquent."  Again  :  "  The  Revolution  of 
the  8th  was  completed,  and  Paris  was  no  longer  agi- 
tated. We  went  to  see  Madame  Letitia  Bonaparte,  who 
then  lived  with  Joseph.  She  appeared  calm,  though 
far  from  being  at  ease,  for  her  extreme  paleness  and 
the  convulsive  movements  she  evinced  whenever  an 
unexpected  noise  met  her  ear,  gave  her  features  a 
ghastly  air.  In  these  moments  she  appeared  to  me 
truly  like  the  mother  of  the  Gracchi.  And  her  situa- 
tion added  force  to  the  idea  !  She  had  j)erhaps  more 
at  stake  than  that  famous  Roman  matron."' 

Whatever  her  faults  of  character,  and  she  could 
scarcely  have  been  the  mother  of  Xajjoleon  if  she  had 
not  possessed  some  of  those  imperfections  which  were 
conspicuous  in  him,  she  was  thoroughly  devoted  to 
the  interest  of  her  sons.  When  all  of  them  except 
Lucien  were  kings,  she  was  unceasing  in  her  solicita- 
tions to  the  Emj)eror  on  his  behalf.  And  when  he 
told  her  that  she  loved  Lucien  more  than  she  did  the 
rest  of  the  family,  she  nobly  answered,  "  The  cliild  of 
whom  I  am  the  most  fond  is  always  the  one  who 
happens  to  be  the  most  unfortunate."  She  seems  on 
some  occasions  to  have  had  more  prudence  and  fore- 
sight than  her  son.  "  On  being  informed  by  Josephine 
of  the  arrest  of  the  Duke  d'Enghien,  she  flew  to  the 
Tuileries,  where  she  made  use  of  all  the  authority  over 


NAPOLEON'S   EARLY   LOVES.  79 

the  First  Consul  which  a  mother  might  be  supposed  to 
possess,  and  even  threw  herself  on  her  knees,  implor- 
ing mercy  for  the  unfortunate  prince.  She  was  highly 
dissatisfied  with  Napoleon's  treatment  of  the  Pope  at 
Fontainebleau,  and  would  say  to  her  brother,  Cardinal 
Fesch,  "  Your  nephew,  by  i^ursuing  this  course,  will 
ruin  himself  and  us  too.  He  should  stop  where  he  is  : 
by  grasping  too  much  he  will  lose  all.  I  have  my 
alarms  for  the  whole  family,  and  think  it  right  to 
provide  against  a  rainy  day  !" 

When  First  Consul,  and  still  more  when  Emj)eror, 
Napoleon  not  only  provided  his  mother  liberally  with 
money,  as  we  have  seen,  but  he  apjDointed  some  of  the 
chief  beauties  of  his  court  to  be  ladies  of  her  house- 
hold. As  is  well  known,  he  did  not  marry  his  first 
love,  nor  his  second,  nor  his  third.  The  first  object  of 
his  vehement  affection  was  a  beautiful  girl  of  sixteen, 
Mademoiselle  de  Colombier.  When  Maret,  who  was 
Secretary  of  State  when  Xapoleon  was  First  Consul, 
asked  him  what  came  of  his  attachment,  he  answered 
that  nothing  came  of  it,  because  he  was  at  the  time 
only  a  lieutenant  of  artillery,  and  the  Revolution 
breaking  out,  he  was  sent  to  another  garrison.  '*  ^V^e 
swore  eternal  fidelity,  but  the  impossibility  of  corre- 
sponding hopelessly  separated  us.''  He  saw  her  again 
twenty  years  afterward,  when  she  had  long  been  the 
wife  of  M.  de  Bressieux.  He  was  astonished  at  the  rav- 
ages which  time  had  made  on  her  good  looks.  He  gave 
her  husband  a  lucrative  office,  and  made  his  first  love 
a  lady  companion  in  the  household  of  his  mother.  She 
succeeded  Madame  de  St.  Peon  in  this  api3ointment. 
Madame  de  Fontanges  was  the  inseparable  attendant 


80  THE   MOTHER   OF   NAPOLEON. 

of  Madame  Mere.  At  tlie  first  grand  fete  given  by 
Napoleon  after  his  marriage  with  Josephine  de  Beau- 
harnais,  his  mother  entered  next  to  his  wife,  and  wore 
"  a  white  velvet  bonnet  trimmed  with  nacarat  feathers, 
a  robe  of  cherry-colored  satin,  bordered  by  deep  black 
blonde.  Her  ornaments  were  antique  cameos  and 
engraved  shells."  K'apoleon's  second  love  was  Made- 
moiselle Eugenie  Desiree  Clary.  His  third  love  affair 
was  the  most  remarkable,  and  justifies  the  remark  of 
Alison,  in  his  "  History  of  Europe"  :  "  Never  did  such 
destinies  depend  upon  the  decision  or  caprice  of  the 
moment.  Madame  de  Permon,  a  lady  of  rank  and 
singular  attractions  from  Corsica,  in  whose  family 
Napoleon  had  from  infancy  been  intimate,  and  whose 
daughter  afterward  became  Duchess  d'Abrantes,  re- 
fused in  one  morning  the  hand  of  Napoleon  for  her- 
self, that  of  his  brother  Jerome  for  her  daughter,  and 
that  of  his  sister  Pauline  for  her  son.  She  little 
thought  that  she  was  declining  for  herself  the  throne 
of  Charlemagne,  for  her  daughter  that  of  Charles  V., 
and  for  her  son  the  most  beautiful  princess  in  Euroi)e  I" 
Alison  inadvertently  wrote  Joseph  for  Jerome.  ^A"e 
have  corrected  the  error,  for  Joseph  was  already  mar- 
ried to  Mademoiselle  Clary,  the  sister  of  Napoleon's 
second  love. 

Napoleon's  motive  in  proposing  to  Madame  de  Per- 
mon, his  third  attraction,  was  probably  the  hope  that 
the  union  of  her  family  name  of  Comnenus  with  that 
of  Calomeros,  the  ancestor  of  the  Bonapartes,  would 
guarantee  him  speedy  promotion.  It  was  an  extraordi- 
nary offer,  however,  considering  she  was  eighteen  years 
his  senior,  and  had  been  the  contemporaneous  if  not 


PROPOSING   TO   MADAME    DE    PERMON.  81 

rival  beauty  of  his  own  mother  in  Corsica.  The  story 
is  thus  told  in  Goodrich's  "Court  of  Napoleon": 
"  On  the  8th  of  October,  1795,  Madame  de  Permon,  a 
lady  of  Corsican  buth  and  of  Greek  descent,  became 
a  widow.  She  was  exactly  the  age  of  Napoleon's 
mother,  and  that  lady  and  herself — Letitia  Ramolini 
and  Panoria  Comnenus — had  been  in  their  youth  the 
beauties  of  Ajaccio.  Their  attractions,  however,  were 
of  so  opposite  a  nature  that  jealousy  never  occurred 
to  them,  and  their  friendship  endured  through  life. 
Mile.  Panoria  married  M.  de  Permon,  and  Mile. 
Letitia  married  Charles  Bonaparte.  Madame  de  Per- 
mon, herself  the  mother  of  a  family,  often  carried  her 
playmate's  second  son.  Napoleon,  in  her  arms,  and 
even  danced  him  on  her  knees.  When,  therefore,  she 
became  a  widow,  at  the  age  of  fortj^-four,  Napoleon 
being  but  a  few  months  over  twenty-six,  she  was 
certainly  justified  in  expressing  astonishment  at,  and 
in  treating  with  levity,  a  proposition  which  the  young 
officer  one  day  made  to  her. 

"  She  was  in  deep  mourning,  and  lived  in  absolute 
retirement.  Her  physician  having  advised  her,  how- 
ever, to  allow  herself  some  recreation,  she  consented  to 
an  incognito  attendance  at  the  opera  for  a  short  season. 
Napoleon,  who  was  a  constant  visitor  at  her  house, 
profited  by  the  opportunities  thus  presented,  and 
passed  every  evening  in  the  society  of  the  widow,  A 
few  days  afterward  he  proposed  to  her  an  alliance, 
which  should  forever  unite  the  two  families.  '  It  is,' 
added  he,  '  between  my  sister  Pauline  and  your  son 
Albert.  Albert  has  some  fortune  ;  my  sister  has  noth- 
ing ;  but  I  am  in  a  condition  to  obtain  much  for  those 


82  THE   MOTHER   OF   NAPOLEON. 

who  are  related  to  me,  and  I  can  get  a  good  office  for 
her  husband.  The  alliance  would  make  me  happy. 
You  know  what  a  pretty  girl  my  sister  is.  My  mother 
is  your  friend.  Come,  say  yes,  and  the  matter  shall 
be  settled.' 

"  Madame  de  Permon  replied  that  she  could  not 
answer  for  her  son,  and  that  she  should  not  influence 
his  decision.  Napoleon  then  projiosed  another  match 
between  his  brother  Jerome  and  Madame  de  Permon' s 
dauG:hter,  Mile.  Laura.  '  Whv,  Jerome  is  younger 
than  Laurette,'  said  the  widow,  laughing.  '  Indeed, 
Napoleon,  you  are  playing  the  high  friend  to-day  and 
marrying  everybody,  even  children.'  Napoleon  then 
confessed  that  that  morning  a  marriage  breeze  had 
blown  over  him,  and  that  he  had  a  third  union  to  pro- 
pose— an  alliance  between  her  and  himself,  as  soon  as 
etiquette  and  regard  to  propriety  would  permit  it. 

'*  Madame  de  Permon  was  at  first  annoyed,  and  then 
amused.  She  burst  into  a  hearty  laugh,  at  which  the 
petitioner  was  sorely  vexed.  '  My  dear  Napoleon, 
let  us  talk  seriously.  You  fancy  you  are  acquainted 
with  my  age ;  the  truth  is,  you  know  nothing  about 
it.  I  shall  not  tell  it  you,  for  it  is  one  of  my  little 
weaknesses.  I  shall  merely  say  that  I  am  old  enough 
to  be  your  mother,  .  .  Spare  me  this  kind  of  joke  ;  it 
distresses  me,  coming  from  you.'  Napoleon  answered 
her  that  he  was  serious  ;  that  the  age  of  the  woman 
whom  he  should  marry  would  be  indifferent  to  him, 
provided,  like  herself,  she  did  not  appear  to  be  past 
thirty  ;  that  he  had  maturely  considered  the  proposal 
he  had  made  ;  that  he  wished  to  marry,  and  that  the 
idea  he  had  suggested  suited  him   in   every  respect. 


IN   EXILE   AT    ELBA.  83 

At  any  rate,  lie  asked  her  to  think  of  it.  She  gave 
him  her  hand,  and  said  that  her  pretensions  did  not 
asi)ire  to  conquer  the  heart  of  a  young  man  of  twenty- 
six,  and  that  slie  hojDed  their  friendship  would  not  be 
interrupted  by  this  incident." 

None  of  the  i^roposed  marriages  came  to  pass. 
Madame  de  Permon  soon  afterward  had  a  quarrel  with 
Napoleon,  and  they  did  not  meet  again  until  he  had 
become  the  husband  of  Josephine.  It  was  singular, 
however,  and  exhibits  the  strangeness  of  his  caprices, 
that  he  should  wish  to  marry  the  playmate  and  equal 
in  age  of  his  mother. 

In  the  summer  of  1814,  when  Napoleon  was  an  exile 
at  Elba,  his  mother,  accompanied  by  his  sister  Pauline, 
went  there  to  cheer  him,  in  his  fallen  fortunes,  by  their 
company.  When  he  was  at  his  last  j)lace  of  exile,  St. 
Helena,  the  mother  wrote  affectionately  to  him,  and 
expressed  her  desire  and  intention  of  joining  him.  It 
was  his  mother  who  sent  the  physician  and  confessor  to 
him  at  St.  Helena,  fearing  that  the  English  physicians 
w^ould  feel  li  ttle  interest  in  his  recovery  from  his  long 
and  painful  malady.  The  nature  of  the  malady  was 
not  known  until  after  his  death.  In  his  will,  dated 
the  loth  of  Ai)ril,  1821,  at  Longwood,  Island  of  St. 
Helena,  he  says,  in  Section  7,  "I  thank  my  good  and 
most  excellent  mother,  the  Cardinal"  (his  mother's 
half-brother,  Cardinal  Fesch),  "  my  brothers  Joseph, 
Lucien,  and  Jerome  ;  Julie,  Hortense,  Caroline,  Eugene, 
for  the  interest  they  have  continued  to  feel  for  me.  I 
pardon  Louis  for  the  libel  he  published  in  1820  ;  it  is 
replete  \\ith  false  assertions  and  falsified  documents." 
He  left  his  silver  night-lamp  to  his  mother  ;  if  he  did 


84  THE   MOTHER   OF   NAPOLEOX. 

not  leave  lier  money  it  was  because  she  had  already  an 
abundance  for  all  her  wants.  The  physician  whom  his 
mother  had  sent  him  from  France,  F.  Antomarchi, 
records  in  his  journal  that  after  the  Emperor's  death 
he  sailed  to  England,  and  on  arriving  in  London  wrote 
at  once  to  Madame  Mere  to  inform  her  of  his  return. 
He  had  taken  a  j)laster  cast  of  ISTax^oleon' s  face,  and 
presented  a  copy  to  Madame  Mere.  He  saw  both  her 
and  Pauline.  The  mother's  emotion,  he  tells  us,  was 
even  greater  than  the  sister's  on  learning  that  Najjoleon 
was  dead.  He  dared*  not  describe  his  terrible  suffer- 
ings. "  I  was  obliged  to  use  the  greatest  caution,  and 
only  to  relate  to  her  part  of  what  I  had  witnessed.  At 
a  second  visit  she  was  more  calm  and  resigned.  I 
entered  into  several  details,  which  were  frequently 
interrupted  by  the  jDaroxysms  of  her  grief.  But  if  I 
suspended  my  recital,  that  afflicted  mother  dried  up 
her  tears,  and  recommenced  her  questions.  It  was  a 
struggle  between  courage  and  affliction  which  x)re- 
sented  a  most  heart-rending  spectacle.  I  saw  her  a 
third  time,  when  she  expressed  herself  in  terms  of  the 
utmost  kindness  toward  me,  and  as  a  proof  of  her 
satisfaction  offered  me  a  diamond,  whicli,  coming  as  it 
does  from  the  mother  of  the  Emperor,  shall  never  leave 
me." 

The  same  skilful  physician  who  had  watclied  and 
tended  so  earnestly  the  last  lingering  illness  of  Xapo- 
leon,  tells  us  that  after  his  death  "  he  felt  a  curiosity 
to  examine  the  head  of  this  great  man,  according  to 
the  craniological  system  of  Drs.  Gall  and  Spurzheim," 
and  that  the  following  was  its  conspicuous  character- 
istics : 


A   MOTHER'S   DEVOTION.  85 

1.  Oracan  of  Dissimulation. 

2.  Organ  of  Conquest. 

3.  Organ  of  Kindness  and  Benevolence. 

4.  Organ  of  Imagination. 

5.  Organ  of  Ambition  and  Love  of  Glorv. 

Of  tlie  class  of  intellectual  faculties  he  found  : 

1.  The  Organ  of  Individuality,  or  knowledge  of 
individuals  and  things. 

2.  Organ  of  Locality — of  the  relation  of  space. 

3.  Orsan  of  Calculation. 

4.  Organ  of  Comparison. 

o.  Organ  of  Causality— of  the  faculty  of  indirection 
— of  a  philosophical  head. 

As  the  features  and  eyes  of  Napoleon  were  like  his 
mother's,  so  no  doubt  were  the  mental  and  moral  char- 
acteristics of  the  mother  and  the  son  alike.  The  force 
of  will  and  the  ambition  to  conquer  obstacles  are  seen 
in  the  mother  as  in  the  son. 

Before  she  dreamed  that  he  w^as  destined  to  die  in 
his  island  prison  in  the  prime  of  manhood,  his  mother 
made  every  effort  to  console  him  by  her  letters  from 
Rome,  where  she  resided  ev^er  since  his  escape  from 
Elba,  and  offered  him  all  that  she  i:)ossessed.  "  For 
me,"  he  said  gratefully,  looking  back  on  earlier  days, , 
''  my  mother  would  without  a  murmur  have  doomed 
herself  to  live  on  bro^vn  bread.  Loftiness  of  sentiment 
still  reigned  iDaramount  in  her  breast ;  pride  and  noble 
ambition  were  not  yet  subdued  by  avarice." 

The  Duchess  d' Abrantes  adds  :  "  Of  all  that  Napo- 
leon had  said  at  St.  Helena  respecting  his  mother, 
Count  Las  Casas,  on  his  return  to  Europe,  witnessed 
the  literal  fulfilment.     No  sooner  had  he  detailed  the 


86  THE   MOTHER   OF   NAPOLEON. 

story  of  the  ex-Emperor\s  situation,  than  the  answer 
returned  by  the.  courier  was,  that  her  Avhole  fortune 
was  at  her  son's  disposal.  In  October,  1818,  she  ad- 
dressed an  affecting  appeal  to  the  allied  sov^ereigns 
assembled  at  Aix  la  Chapelle,  on  his  behalf  :  "  Sirs,"' 
said  she,  "  I  am  a  mother,  and  my  son's  life  is  dearer 
to  me  than  my  own.  In  the  name  of  Him  whose 
essence  is  goodness,  and  of  whom  your  Imperial  and 
Royal  Majesties  are  the  image,  I  entreat  you  to  put  a 
period  to  his  misery,  and  to  restore  him  to  liberty. 
For  this  I  im^Dlore  Grod,  and  I  implore  you  who  are  His 
vicegerents  on  earth.  Reasons  of  state  have  their 
limits,  and  posterity,  which  gives  immortality,  adores 
above  all  things  the  generosity  of  conquerors." 

The  domestic  relations  of  Napoleon  made  his 
mother's  part  toward  her  two  daughters-in-law  and 
the  several  members  of  her  own  family  not  a  little 
difficult.  The  daughter  of  her  early  friend  and  con- 
temporary, and  of  her  son's  thii'd  love,  Madame  de 
Permon,  the  beautiful  and  talented  wife  of  Marshal 
Junot,  the  Duchess  d' Abrantes,  who  is  the  most  reliable 
authority  about  the  family  of  the  Bonapartes,  says  : 
"  Madame  Mere  was  very  reserved  in  attending  to  the 
Empress  Maria  Louisa  ;  she  observed  the  same  rule 
with  respect  to  her  second  daughter-in-law  as  she  had 
observed  toward  her  first :  that  is  to  say,  she  seldom 
spoke  of  her,  and  was  always  anxious  to  establish 
friendly  feelings  among  her  numerous  children.  In 
her  relations  with  the  latter,  Madame  Mere  admii'ably 
maintained  the  dignity  of  her  own  position.  During 
the  first  few  months  of  her  marriage,  the  new  Empress 
seemed  to  imagine  that  the  only  individuals  of  the  Im- 


MARIA   LOUISA   AND   LETITIA.  87 

13erial  family  worthy  of  her  attention  were  Xapoleon 
and  the  Qneen  of  Naples.  Madame  Mere,  whose  ex- 
cellent nnderstanding  pointed  out  to  her  the  impro- 
priety of  creating  any  discord  through  complaints, 
which  after  all  must  be  unavailing,  determined  to  de- 
pend on  herself  alone  for  securing  the  respect  of  her 
young  daughter-in-law.  One  day  Maria  Louisa  went 
to  visit  Naj^oleon's  mother.  'Madame,'  said  she,  'I 
have  come  to  dine  with  you.  But  I  do  not  come  as 
the  Empress — ^I  wish  merely  to  pay  a  friendly  visit  to 
you.'  Madame,  drawing  Maria  Louisa  toward  her 
and  kissing  her  forehead,  replied,  '  I  shall  treat  you 
with  no  ceremony.  I  shall  receive  you  as  my  daughter, 
and  the  Emperor' s  wife  shall  have  the  dinner  of  the 
Emperor's  mother.'  The  Empress  Josephine  was  less 
attentive  than  Maria  Louisa  to  Madame  Mere,  and  in 
this  she  was  ill  advised.  The  Emperor  did  not  exter- 
nally show  his  mother  much  attention,  but  he  was 
always  deeply  offended  when  he  heard  that  any  one 
had  slighted  her." 

We  find  a  discrepancy  in  the  age  assigned  to  the 
mother  of  Napoleon  at  the  time  of  her  death.  Mrs. 
Ellis  states  -that  she  lived  to  nearly  eighty  years  of  age, 
but  William  Hazlitt,  in  his  extensive  and  able  "  Life  of 
Napoleon, ' '  says  that  she  was  eighty-six  years  old  when 
she  died  at  Rome,  on  the  26th  of  April,  1836.  An  acci- 
dent which  she  sustained  in  1830,  while  walking  in  her 
garden,  made  the  last  years  of  her  life  very  painful. 

In  forming  a  candid  judgment  of  the  character  of 
Letitia  Bonaparte,  v/e  must  remember  that  her  charac- 
ter was,  no  doubt,  largely  influenced  by  the  checkered 
and  eventful  fortunes  of  her  life.     Had  she  not  been 


88  THE  MOTHER  OF  NAPOLEON. 

driven  from  lier  native  Corsica,  the  tenor  of  her 
thoughts  and  deeds  would  have  differed  widely  from 
what  the  necessities  of  exile,  the  early  loss  of  her 
husband,  the  adventurous  career  of  her  second  son, 
involving  the  extremes  of  fortune  to  all  the  members 
of  her  family,  actually  made  them.  It  is  neither  just 
nor  possible  to  separate  the  character  of  an  individual 
from  his  or  her  surroundings.  Napoleon  himself  has 
been  accused  of  cruelty  and  a  total  indifference  to 
human  life,  yet  his  physician  credits  him  with  natural 
kindness  and  benevolence.  His  mother  has  been 
charged  with  miserliness  in  her  later  years,  not  only 
by  historians,  but  by  the  son  who  always  cherished 
gratitude  and  affection  for  her.  But  what  can  be  more 
likely  to  create  a  dread  of  spending  money  than  a  life 
passed  in  alternations  of  splendor  and  obscurity  ;  the 
mother  of  the  greatest  ruler  since  Charlemagne  one 
day,  and  of  an  imprisoned  and  dethroned  exile  the 
next.  As  she  herself  said,  she  prepared  herself  for 
rainy  days,  and  they  too  surely  came,  with  torrents  of 
disaster  and  misfortune.  She  had  been  the  belle  of 
Corsica  in  her  giiihood,  and  she  lived  to  see  her 
daughters,  especially  the  naughtiest  of  them,  Pauline, 
the  most  beautiful  princess  in  Europe.  If  she  did  not 
reprove  their  frivolities  and  intrigues  with  a  strong  dis- 
approval of  a  Christian  mother,  we  must  remember  the 
universal  laxity  of  French  morals,  and  especially  of 
the  Court  in  the  days  in  which  she  liv^ed.  If  the  Court 
of  Louis  XVI.  was  immoral  and  dissolute,  that  of 
Napoleon  was  no  better.  She  had  to  tolerate  what  she 
did  not  approve,  but  she  herself  showed  always  a  con- 
tempt for  sensuality.     Her    indomitable    spirit    rose 


NAPOLEON'S   LAST   DAYS.  89 

buoyantly  above  the  waves  of  adverse  fortune  ;  she 
had  shared  the  perils  of  her  husband  in  Corsica,  and 
she  was  ready  to  share  those  of  the  son  whom  she  had 
given  birth  to  amid  the  joerils  of  flight  and  revolution. 
That  son's  estimate  of  her  is  certainly  impartial,  for 
aflfection  never  prejudiced  his  keen  judgment  of  those 
nearest  to  him.  We  must  therefore  accept  as  ab- 
solutely true  his  statement  that  his  mother,  alone  and 
unaided,  protected  and  supported  her  eight  children 
when  they  were  left  without  a  father  and  without  a 
country.  He  might  well  praise  her  unselfishness,  her 
devotion,  her  maternal  fidelity  and  affection.  Had  he 
listened  to  her  counsel  and  been  warned  in  time  by  her, 
that  by  grasping  at  too  much  he  imperilled  all,  he 
might  have  reigned  securely  over  the  people  that 
worshipped  him,  have  kept  the  peace  with  other 
powers,  and  in  a  larger  and  happier  life  have  remained 
"  tete  d'armee'' — his  dying  Avords — instead  of  sacrific- 
ing that  army  to  his  insatiate  thirst  for  power.  He 
had  loved  to  read  the  life  of  Alexander  the  Great  when 
a  child,  and  he  remembered  Alexander  in  lamenting 
that  there  were  no  more  Avorlds  for  him  to  conquer. 
To  become  master  of  all  Europe  he  sacrificed  an  im- 
perial sovereignty  of  France,  which  had  not  only  a 
magnificent  army  to  defend  it,  but  which  had  taken 
deep  root  in  the  affections  of  the  people. 

The  mother  of  the  Emperor,  discrowned  and  exiled 
and  in  a  few  years  dead,  might  well  seek  a  refuge,  in 
the  evening  of  her  days,  in  Rome,  the  Eternal  City, 
where,  more  than  in  any  other  city  in  the  world,  her 
mind  and  memory  could  reflect  on  the  evanescence  of 
earthly  empires,  the  vanity  of  human  wishes,  and  the 


90  THE    MOTHER   OF   NAPOLEON. 

futility  of  merely  secular  ambition.  Here,  no  doubt, 
the  consolations  of  religion  would  remind  her  of  a  city 
still  more  eternal — 

"City  glorious,  a  great  and  distant  City, 
A  mansion  incorruptible" 

—whose  palaces  are  grander  than  the  Tuileries,  where 
crowns  can  never  perish,  and  where  no  disturbance  can 
have  place.  There,  in  the  requiem  of  death,  she  has 
slept  for  forty-seven  years,  under  the  shadow  of  those 
imperial  Csesars  with  whom  her  son  was  worthy  of 
compare. 


MONICA,    MOTHER  OF   ST.   AUGUSTINE. 

Those  not  familiar  with  ecclesiastical  biography 
may  need  to  be  reminded  that  there  were  two  St.  Au- 
gnstines  who  have  left  illustrious  records  in  the  an- 
nals of  Christianity.  One  of  them  was  the  monk,  who 
with  forty  of  his  comrades  was  sent  by  Pope  Gregory 
the  Great  to  Christianize  Britain,  and  who,  landing  on 
the  coast  of  Kent,  became  the  first  Archbishop  of  Can- 
terbury. The  marble  chair  which  is  still  seen  in  Can- 
terbury Cathedral,  and  which  is  used  at  the  enthrone- 
ment of  each  successive  Primate  of  all  England,  has 
the  traditional  prestige  of  having  been  the  identical 
throne  of  the  first  bishop  of  the  Anglo-Saxons.  But 
the  other  and  greater  St.  Augustine,  who  became 
after  his  conversion  first  a  priest  and  then  Bishop  of 
Hippo  in  Africa,  is  he  whose  mother  has  left  an  example 
of  encouragement  and  benediction  to  the  Christian 
mothers  of  all  time.  It  is  of  her  that  we  would  now 
speak  with  the  pen  of  truthful  delineation.  But  as  her 
name  has  become  famous  chiefly  through  the  surpass- 
ing greatness  of  her  son,  and  as  that  son  became  great 
chiefly  through  her  incessant  and  at  length  successful 
efforts  to  \vin  him  from  ' '  the  lust  of  the  eye,  the  lust  of 
the  flesh,  and  the  pride  of  life,"  it  is  impossible  to 
separate  the  two  or  not  to  think  of  Monica  when  we 
recall  Augustine,  or  to  eulogize  Augustine  without  con- 
fessing the  blessed  influence  of  Monica. 

Even  secular  historians  cannot  write  the  history  of 


92  MONICA,   MOTHER   OF   ST.  AUGUSTINE. 

Western  civilization  without  frequent  reference  to  the 
great  Fatlier  of  the  Latin  Church.  For  although  the 
episcopal  labors  of  St.  Augustine  were  located  in  Af- 
rica, his  writings  were  in  the  Latin  tongue,  his  mission 
came  from  Rome,  the  seat  of  Latin  Christianity,  and  his 
influence  was  one  of  the  great  forces  of  Western  civili- 
zation in  Europe.  To  his  acute  mind  is  due  that  subtle 
system  of  philosophic  theology  which  Calvin  and 
other  theologians  subsequently  developed,  for  his 
deep  musings  were  largely  occupied  with  fate,  free- 
will, and  those  profound  problems  relating  to  pre- 
destination which  have  since  been  known  by  his  name. 
His  "  City  of  God,"  his  sermons,  his  "Confessions," 
and  his  commentaries  on  the  Scriptures  are  among  the 
noblest  classics  of  the  Christian  Church. 

Human  nature  is  everywhere  the  same,  and  so  also 
is  divine  grace  and  truth.  But  the  circumstances  of 
individuals  vary  according  to  the  times  they  live  in  and 
the  persons,  scenes,  and  influences  that  surround  them. 
St.  Augustine  was  born  under  very  different  auspices 
from  those  of  the  Christians  in  the  nineteenth  century. 
Although  Christianity  had  a  large  titular  domain  in  the 
fourth  century,  and  the  Roman  emperors  were  nomi- 
nally Christians,  yet  the  dissensions  of  Christians  as  to 
doctrine  were  so  great  and  their  morals  were  so  largely 
impregnated  with  heathenism,  that  when  the  third  cen- 
tury closed  it  seemed  as  if  the  salt  of  Christ's  Evangel 
had  lost  its  savor  and  the  light  and  sweetness  of  Jesus 
had  deserted  his  professed  disciples.  A  wholesale 
relapse  into  paganism  seemed  imminent  until  St.  Au- 
gustine lifted  up  the  cross  anew,  and  "the  plague  was 
stayed." 


THE    HUSBAND   OF  MONICA.  01^ 

It  is  from  his  own  "Confessions,"  a  work  that  has 
been  translated  again  and  again  into  all  the  languages 
of  Europe,  that  w^e  must  gather  the  chief  characteristics 
both  of  his  mother  and  himself.  His  temptations 
were  those  of  sensuality  in  its  most  subtle  form  of  co- 
alescence with  intellectual  activity,  a  sceptical  imagina- 
tion, and  a  thirst  for  knowledge.  His  father,  Patricius, 
was  a  heathen  until  within  a  few  years  of  his  death, 
which  occurred  when  St.  Augustine  was  a  lad  of  seven- 
teen. There  are  instances  of  the  marriage  of  Jew  and 
Christian,  of  Christian  and  Turk,  of  Roman  Catholic 
and  Protestant,  and  even  of  white  and  black,  in  our 
own  day,  but  Monica  reluctantly,  and  from  a  sense  of 
filial  obedience,  gave  her  hand  to  the  heathen  freeman 
Patricius.  He  was  a  native  of  the  ancient  Roman  city 
of  Tagaste,  not  far  from  the  ancient  battle-field  of  Zama, 
famous  for  the  decisive  victory  by  which  the  third  of 
the  Scipios,  who  had  fought  with  honor  in  the  Punic 
w^ars,  put  an  end  to  them,  and  became  henceforth 
known  as  Scipio  Africanus. 

This  was  some  six  centuries,  however,  before  the 
days  when  the  Roman  lady  Faconda  gave  birth  to 
Monica,  the  mother  of  Augustine,  in  the  same  year 
that  a  great  Father  of  the  Church,  St.  Jerome,  was 
born  at  Stridon,  in  Dalmatia.  Many  great  saints 
were  rising  at  this  time  in  difierent  parts  of  Christen- 
dom to  fight  the  good  fight  of  faith  against  the  pagan 
and  the  infidel,  as  well  as  the  heretic  and  schismatic. 
The  galaxy  includes  such  stars  as  Gregory  Nazian- 
zen,  Gregory  of  Nyssa,  Hilary  of  Poictiers,  and 
Martin  of  Tours.  The  Church  was  emerging  from 
the   catacombs,   and   Sylvester   occupied   the   See   of 


94  MONICA,   MOTHER   OF   ST.   AUGUSTINE. 

Rome.  Atlianasius,  so  well  known  for  his  battles 
with  Arius,  was  bishop  of  Alexandria.  Monica's 
birth  took  place  in  332,  and  she  was  bred  in  the 
Catholic  or  orthodox  faith,  to  which  her  parents  had 
steadily  adhered,  althongh  their  native  town  was 
almost  given  over  to  the  Danatists.  They  were  per- 
sons of  genteel  poverty,  who  kept  up  appearances  and  a 
retinue  of  servants  upon  a  scanty  exchequer.  One  of 
these  servants  had  nursed  the  father  of  Monica  in  his 
infancy,  and  had  obtained  great  authority  in  the  house- 
hold. She  was  a  strict  but  judicious  monitor  to  the 
future  mother  of  St.  Augustine,  and  it  was  through  her 
restraining  influence  that  Monica,  after  her  marriage 
with  Patricius,  was  enabled  to  live  peaceably  with  her 
mother-in-law,  who,  at  first,  did  all  she  could  to  preju- 
dice the  pagan  husband  against  his  nnofifending  Chris- 
tian wife.  Monica  returned  good  for  evil,  and  when 
her  mother-in-law  and  the  servants  wliispered  against 
her  "she  so  overcame,  by  observance,  and  persevering 
endurance  and  meekness,  that  in  the  end  these  whis" 
pering  tongues  were  silenced,"  and  the  wife  and 
mother  of  Patricius  lived  together  "  with  a  remarkable 
sweetness  of  mutual  kindness."  It  is  her  illustrious 
son  who  tells  ns  this,  and  who  exclaims,  "Such  was 
she,  Thyself,  O  God,  her  most  inward  instructor, 
teaching  her  in  the  school  of  the  heart. 
Finally,  her  own  husband,  toward  the  end  of  his 
earthly  life,  did  she  gain  unto  Thee.  She  was  also  the 
servant  of  Thy  servants.  Whomsoever  of  them  knew 
her  did,  in  her,  much  praise  and  honor  Thee ;  for 
that,  through  the  witness  of  the  fruits  of  a  hol}'^  con 
versation,  they  perceived  Thy  presence  in  her  heart." 


ST.    AUGUSTINE   AT    SCHOOL.  95 

We  hear  much  in  our  own  time  of  the  dangers  and 
temptations  of  a  college  life.  Undoubtedly,  if  a  youth 
be  naturally  inclined  to  low  pleasures  and  intellectual 
dissipation,  he  will  find  plenty  of  opportunity  when  he 
is  away  from  home  and  among  unformed  characters  of 
his  own  age.  Carthage,  which  was  now  a  part  of  the 
Roman  Empire,  was  the  seat  of  the  best  learning  of  the 
time,  and  thither  St.  Augustine  was  sent,  in  the  year 
371.  Here  he  studied  rhetoric,  heathen  literature,  and 
philosophy.  The  "Hortensius"  of  Cicero  seems  to 
have  kindled  in  his  mind  a  higher  ambition  than  it  had 
been  familiar  with.  The  Scriptures  appeared  to  him 
trivial  when  compared  with  the  heathen  classics,  and 
especially  with  Cicero.  His  "  swelling  pride,"  he  tells 
us,  "  shrank  from  their  lowliness."  Augustine  re- 
mained at  Carthage  until  his  nineteenth  year,  at 
Monica's  expense,  his  father  having  died  two  years 
before. 

It  was  a  great  consolation  to  Monica  that  her  hus- 
band had  become  a  Christian  before  his  death,  and 
that  the  last  few  years  of  their  union  had  been  peace- 
ful and  affectionate.  It  had  not  always  been  so.  Pa- 
tricius  was  a  man  of  violent  temper,  who  had  abused, 
though  he  did  not  beat  her,  had  impeded  her  relig- 
ious doctrines,  mocked  at  her  high  standard  of  virtue, 
and  when  the  sorrow- stricken  Monica  learned  that 
her  son  Augustine,  long  given  to  immoralit}^,  had  be- 
come the  father  of  an  illegitimate  child,  Patricius  only 
laughed  as  though  his  sowing  of  wild  oats  were  a  mat- 
ter of  course.  Tennyson  has  said,  as  other  poets  had 
said  before  him, 


96  MONICA,   MOTHER   OF   ST.  AUGUSTINE. 

"  That  men  may  rise  on  stepping-stones 
Of  their  dead  selves  to  higher  things." 

St.  Augustine,  after  his  conversion,  was  an  illustra- 
tion of  this.  He  never  speaks  of  his  illegitimate  off- 
spring in  his  "Confessions"  except  as  "  the  fruit  of 
his  sin."  "I  had  but  one  dream  at  that  time,"  he 
says,  "  to  love  and  to  be  loved."  This  son,  whom  he 
called  Adeodatus,  the  Latin  equivalent  of  the  Greek 
Theodoras,  was  present  at  Monica' s  death,  and  made 
great  lamentations  for  her.  At  the  time  of  his  father' s 
conversion  this  son  was  fifteen  years  of  age.  Augus- 
tine describes  him  as  "most  excellently  made,  though 
born  in  sin,  and  of  rare  wit  and  talents,  surpassing 
those  of  many  learned  men."  There  is  true  pathos 
in  the  fact  that  the  penitent  convert,  when  seeking 
baptism,  joined  his  son  with  himself  and  his  friend 
and  fellow-convert,  Alypius,  as  "our  contemporary  in 
grace."  The  youth  whose  talents  "  struck  awe"  into 
his  father's  soul  died  soon  after,  and  Augustine  sadly 
says,  "  I  remember  him  without  anxiety,  fearing  noth- 
ing now  for  his  childhood,  his  youth,  or  his  whole 
life."  The  sin  of  his  youth,  his  dead  self,  thus  be- 
came, on  his  conversion,  a  stepping-stone  to  higher 
things,  and  an  earthly  love  was  transformed  into  a 
heavenly. 

For  the  mother  of  this  boy  Augustine  entertained  a 
sincere  affection,  although  tlieir  relations,  which  con- 
tinued for  fifteen  years,  were  unlawful.  One  is  re- 
minded of  Abelard  and  Eloise,  at  a  later  date,  on 
learning  that  the  mistress  entered  a  convent  when  her 
lover  bi^carae  a  Christian,  and  then   a   "[iriest  and   a 


MOTHER   AND   SON.  97 

bisliop.  Like  Charles  the  Twelfth  of  Sweden,  accord- 
ing to  Voltaire,  Augustine  forswore  the  company  of 
women  henceforward,  and  would  not  even  allow  his 
sister  to  keep  house  for  him  after  his  ordination. 

Among  those  whom  Monica  interested  in  the  men- 
tal and  moral  struggles  of  her  son  was  a  venerable 
bishop  who  bade  her  leave  Augustine  alone  in  his 
Manichseism,  and  trust  to  prayers  and  time  for  the 
longed-for  change,  and  who  cheered  her  with  the  words, 
"  It  cannot  be  that  the  son  of  such  tears  should  perish." 
But  the  person  who,  next  to  herself,  had  most  to  do 
with  his  conversion  was  the  great  St.  Ambrose,  Bishop 
of  Milan.  It  was  at  Milan  that  his  baptism  took 
place,  the  saintly  bishop  officiating,  and  there  is  a 
beautiful  tradition  that  as  the  heavenly  light  shone 
upon  their  faces,  the  bishop  and  the  neophyte  sang  in 
alternate  verses  and  by  divine  inspiration  the  grand 
*'Te  Deum,"  which  is  the  most  glorious  of  Christian 
hymns. 

But  before  this  happy  change  was  consummated 
there  was  a  hard  period  of  sorrow  and  probation 
both  for  the  mother  and  the  son.  A  gifted  American 
bishop,  Arthur  Cleveland  Coxe,  of  Western  New 
York,  has  lately  told  us  that  it  is  a  shallow  philos- 
ophy which  pretends  to  deny  and  disregard  the  fore  • 
shadowing  of  dreams.  Monica  believed  in  dreams, 
as  every  one  who  believes  the  Bible  must  to  a  certain 
extent  and  under  reasonable  limitations.  On  one 
occasion,  while  she  slept,  there  appeared  to  her  a 
youth  of  shining  aspect,  who  liad,  as  it  were,  the  face 
of  an  angel,  and  who  whispered  words  of  hope  and 
consolation  to  her  regarding  the  future  conversion  of 


98  MONICA,   MOTHER   OF    ST.   AUGUSTINE. 

her  son.  Slie  herself  seemed  to  be  standing  safely 
upon  a  bridge,  which  no  storm  could  shake  or  waters 
of  destruction  reach.  The  radiant  messenger  assured 
her  that  "where  she  was  there  should  her  son  be 
also."  She  awoke,  and  beheld  Augustine  standing  at 
her  side.  Through  the  long  years  of  waiting  that 
were  yet  to  come  she  drew  comfort  from  the  recollec- 
tion of  this  vision,  and  pondered  it  in  her  heart. 

Slowly  and  silently  the  change  was  wrought.  Au- 
gustine had  a  dear  friend,  Nebridius.  In  his  '.'  Con- 
fessions" he  thus  speaks  of  him,  addressing,  as  is 
his  wont,  "the  Father  of  light  and  God  of  mercy." 
' '  I  had  made  one  friend,  only  too  dear  to  me  from 
a  community  of  pursuits,  and,  like  myself,  in  the 
fresh  opening  flower  of  youth.  I  had  warped  him 
to  those  superstitions  and  ]3ernicious  fables  for  which 
my  mother  bewailed  me.  With  me  he  now  erred 
in  mind,  nor  could  my  soul  be  without  him.  But 
behold !  Thou  wert  close  ujDon  the  steps  of  Thy 
fugitives.  Thou-  tookst  that  man  out  of  this  life, 
when  he  had  scarcely  filled  up  one  whole  year  of  my 
friendship — sweet  to  me,  above  all  sweetness  of  that 
my  life."  Nebridius  was  taken  sick  of  a  fever,  and 
lay  unconscious  and  nigh  unto  death.  "  In  this  state 
he  was  baptized,  unknowing  ;  myself,  meanwhile,  little 
regarding,  and  presuming  that  his  soul  would  retain 
rather  what  it  received  from  me,  than  w^hat  was 
wrought  during  his  unconsciousness.  But  it  proved 
far  otherwise,  for  he  was  refreshed  and  restored. 
Forthwith,  as  soon  as  I  could  speak  to  him — and  that 
was  as  soon  as  he  was  able,  for  I  never  left  him,  and  we 
hung  but  too  much  upon  each  other — I  essayed  to  jest 


MONICA'S   LONG    JOURNEY.  99 

with  him,  as  tliough  he  would  jest  v/ith  me,  at  that 
baptism  which  he  now  understood  that  he  had  received. 
But  he  so  shrunk  from  me  as  from  an  enemy  ;  and  with 
a  wonderful  and  sudden  freedom,  bade  me,  as  I  would 
continue  his  friend,  to  forbear  such  language  to  him. 
I,  all  astonished  and  amazed,  suppressed  my  emotions 
until  he  should  grow  well  enough  for  me  to  deal  with 
him  as  I  would.  But  he  was  taken  away  from  my 
madness.  A  few  days  after,  in  my  absence,  he  was 
attacked  again  with  fever,  and  so  departed."  Augustine 
sorrowed  long  and  bitterly  for  the  loss  of  his  "one 
friend."  They  had  fulhlled  Cicero's  condition  of 
friendship,  in  having  the  same  tastes  and  the  same 
aversions.  "This  it  is,"  adds  Augustine,  "that  is 
loved  in  friends.  Hence  that  mourning  if  one  die,  and 
darkenings  of  sorrow  ;  that  steeping  of  the  heart  in 
tears,  all  sweetness  being  turned  into  bitterness." 

Augustine  at  this  time  was  occupied  with  the  study 
of  the  beautiful,  and,  like  Edmund  Burke,  wrote  a  Ijook 
upon  the  subject.  He  dedicated  it  to  a  famous  orator 
in  Rome,  and  to  Rome  he  himself  set  out  from  Car- 
thage. He  caught  a  sickness  on  his  arrival,  and  while 
sick  studied  the  Scriptures  with  more  attention.  From 
Rome  he  set  out  for  ]SIilan,  where  he  had  received  an 
ax)pointment  as  teacher  of  rhetoric. 

Augustine  was  now  thirty  years  old  ;  it  was  the  year 
385.  Monica  had  for  some  time  been  kept  anxious  by 
the  despondent  tone  of  Augustine's  letters,  and  at  last 
she  resolved,  at  all  hazards,  to  rejoin  him  at  Rome.  In 
those  days  the  journey  was  a  difficult  one,  especially 
for  a  Avoman.  She  was  at  this  time  residing  at  her 
native  place,   Tagaste.     To  meet  the  expenses  of  the 


100  MONICA,   MOTHER   OF   ST.  AUGUSTINE. 

jonrney  she  had  to  sell  her  valuables.  But  she  made 
her  way  to  Carthage,  from  which  her  son  had  sailed  two 
years  before  while  she  was  waiting  on  the  shore,  and 
embarked.  Hardly  had  the  vessel  sailed  when  a  violent 
storm  set  in.  The  hearts  of  all  on  board  sank  with  ap- 
prehension, and  even  the  captain  and  sailors  gave  up 
all  hope.  But  the  faith  which  had  enabled  St.  Paul  to 
tranquillize  a  shij^'s  company  when  he  too  was  travel- 
ling Romeward,  inspired  poor  Monica  with  courage. 
She  cheered  the  sailors  and  restored  their  courage. 
She  told  them  that  though  the  waves  of  the  sea  were 
mighty  and  raged  horribly,  the  Lord  who  ruled  them 
was  mighty  and  could  still  their  raging.  And  so  it 
was.  They  reached  Civita  Yecchia,  and  Monica 
hastened  on  to  Eome,  only  to  find  that  her  son  had  left 
for  Milan.  The  latter  city  is  two  hundred  leagues  from 
Rome,  and  to  reach  it  one  must  cross  the  Apennines. 
This  did  not  scare  her.  The  mountain  passes  had  no 
more  terrors  for  her  than  the  stormy  sea.  So,  after  one 
day's  rest,  she  set  out  for  Milan,  where  the  long  desire 
of  her  soul  was  to  be  accomplished,  and  her  son,  after 
all  his  wanderings  in  the  far  country  of  sin  and  unbe- 
lief, was  to  be  converted  by  the  preaching  of  St. 
Ambrose,  "  whom,''  said  Monica,  "  I  shall  ever  think 
of  as  an  angel  of  God,"  and  receiving  baptism  in  the 
spirit  of  a  little  child  was  to  learn  the  eternal  strain, 
"  Thou  art  the  King  of  Glory,  O  Christ." 

Except  St.  Paul,  Christianity  had  never  gained  a 
greater  convert  than  St.  Augustine,  so  far  as  intellect 
was  concerned.  Augustine  stayed  the  sceptic  process 
that  was  fast  destroying  the  life  of  the  Western  Church. 
His  marvellous  gifts  were  transferred  at  once  from  the 


ST.   AUGUSTINE   AND   HIS  MOTHER. 


PLEASURES   OF    THE   SENSES.  103 

school  of  lieatlienism  to  the  scliool  of  Christ ;  from  the 
vain  babbling  of  false  jjliilosophy  to  the  service  of  ab- 
solute truth.  His  natural  characteristics  became  sanc- 
tified and  consecrated  to  higher  uses.  The  eye  that 
was  so  keen  to  note  things  bea,Litiful  in  books  and 
nature  now  saw  the  beauty  of  the  City  of  God. 
"There  remains,"  he  says,  "the  pleasures  of  these 
eyes  of  my  flesh,  on  which  to  make  my  confessions, 
and  so  to  conclude  the  temptations  of  the  lusts  of  the 
flesh,  which  yet  assail  me,  groaning  earnestly,  and  de- 
sii'ing  to  be  clothed  upon  with  my  home  from  heaven. 
The  eves  love  fair  and  varied  forms,  and  soft  and 
bright  colors.  And  these  afl'ect  me,  waking,  the  whole 
day  ;  nor  is  any  rest  given  me  from  them,  as  there 
is  from  musical,  sometimes  in  silence  from  all  voices. 
For  this  queen  of  colors,  the  light,  bathing  all  which" 
we  behold,  wherever  I  am  through  the  day,  gliding  by 
me  in  varied  forms,  soothes  me  when  engaged  in  other 
things,  and  not  observing  ;  and  so  strongly  doth  it 
entwine  itself,  that,  if  it  be  suddenly  withdrawn,  it  is 
with  longing  sought  for,  and,  if  absent  long,  saddeneth 
the  mind." 

The  pleasures  of  the  senses,  however  exciting  for  the 
moment,  failed  to  satisfy,  and  so  also  did  the  specula- 
tions of  the  mind.  "I  sought,"  he  says,  "for 
pleasures,  sublimities,  truths,  and  fell  headlong  into 
sorrows,  confusions,  errors."  His  was  a  mind  that 
could  argue  on  the  subtlest  points.  Deep  were  his 
thoughts  while  yet  a  youth,  and  they  grew  deeper  still 
when  he  discovered  that  God  has  created  the  soul  and 
reason  of  man  for  His  own  abode,  and  that  happiness 
and  contentment  can  be  found  in  Him  alone.     To  this 


104  MONICA,   MOTHER   OF   ST.  AUGUSTINE. 

day,  when  men  discuss  such  mysterious  matters  as 
time  and  eternity,  one  does  not  often  hear  a  profounder 
answer  than  one  that  St.  Augustine  gave.  '  ' '  Aslv  7ne 
what  time  is,  I  cannot  tell  ;  don't  ask  me,  and  I 
know."  What  a  confession  is  here  of  the  inadequacy 
of  logic  and  language  to  define  the  highest  thoughts  ! 
The  mental  troubles  and  intellectual  conflicts  which 
Augustine  j^assed  through  were  only  exceeded  by  his 
moral  and  sensual  sufferings.  He  had  too  great  a 
soul  to  be  happy  in  sin.  The  unseen  world  was  too 
vivid  to  his  imagination  for  him  to  be  able  to  forget  or 
ignore  it.  He  tasted,  in  the  full  bitterness  of  a  proud 
and  rebellious  spirit,  the  powers  of  the  world  to  come. 
What  must  have  been  the  anguish  of  a  soul  whose 
prayer  each  day  was,  ' '  Convert  me.  Lord  ;  convert  me, 
but  not  to-day.  Save  me,  but  not  yet."  Thus  did 
he  pass  from  youth  to  manhood,  "  still  greedy,"  as  he 
says,  of  enjoying  present  things,  which  passed  away 
and  wasted  his  soul  ;  while  he  said  to  himself,  "  To- 
morrow I  shall  find  it." 

The  angel  wdio  wrestled  in  prayer  for  him  and  shed 
such  tears  of  anguish  was  his  mother,  Monica.  His 
"  Confessions"  are  full  of  the  most  grateful  acknowl- 
edgments to  God  for  what  she  had  wrought  for  him. 
"Thy  faithful  one,"  he  says,  "weeping  to  Thee  for 
me,  more  than  mothers  weep  the  bodily  death  of  their 
children  ;  for  she  discovered  the  death  wherein  I  lay, 
and  Thou  didst  not  despise  her  tears  when,  streaming 
down,  they  watered  the  ground  in  every  place  where 
she  prayed."  To  this  long-suffering  mother,  who  saw 
at  length  3f  the  travail  of  her  soul  and  was  satisfied,  as 
well  as  to  her  son  after  his  conversion,  might  be  applied 


AFTER    SEVE.XTEEX    YEARS.  105 

surely  the  pathetic  words  of  the  Psalmist :  "  He  who  now 
goeth  on  Ms  way  weeping  and  beareth  forth  good  seed 
shall  surely  come  again  with  joy  and  bring  his  sheaves 
with  him."  When  at  last  he  tells  her  that  the  hour 
long  desired  has  come,  and  that  he  has  chosen  Christ 
forever,  she  does  not  doubt  him,  but  as  he  says,  "  She 
triumphs  and  blesses  God."  "  Like  the  widow  of 
Nain,"  exclaims  St.  Augustine  in  his  "Confessions," 
"  she  followed  the  bier  of  her  son  until  the  i)oignancy 
of  her  grief  obtained  from  God  the  answer,  '  I  say  unto 
Thee,  arise ! ' "  It  was  not,  however,  until  after 
seventeen  years  of  anxious  wandering  and  doubt  that 
this  voice  of  his  enfranchisement  was  heard.  The  im- 
mediate circumstances  are  worth  narrating.  An  old 
friend  from  Africa  named  Pontitianus,  one  of  "  them 
that  were  of  Caesar's  household,"  being  a  military 
officer  of  the  imperial  court,  but  a  fervent  Christian, 
paid  Augustine  and  his  mother  and  his  friend  Alypius  a 
visit  at  Milan.  The  old  soldier  of  Christ  and  of  Caesar 
had  travelled  much  in  Gaul,  in  Spain,  in  Italy,  and  in 
Egypt,  and  his  talk  was  much  upon  religious  houses 
which  had  taken  rise  from  St.  Antony,  in  Alexandria, 
and  had  spread  to  Africa.  Augustine  listened  eagerly 
as  the  old  man  narrated  that,  while  the  Emperor  was  at 
the  circus,  he  had  gone  with  three  or  four  friends  to 
walk  in  some  gardens  near  the  town.  On  theu'  road  two 
of  them  went  into  a  hermit's  cell  and  found  a  manu- 
script life  of  St.  Antony,  which  they  began  to  read. 
"  Tell  me,"  said  one  to  the  other,  "  to  what,  after  all, 
does  our  life  tend  ?  What  do  we  seek  or  hope  for  ? 
The  favor  of  the  Emperor  i  But  that  is  here  to-day  and 
gone  to-morrow  !     Instead  of  that,  if  we  wiU  seek  the 


106  MONICA,   MOTHER   OF   ST.   AUGUSTINE. 


95 


favor  of  God,  it  is  onrs  at  once,  now,  and  forever ! 
When  Pontitianus  and  the  others  joined  them,  the  two 
men  declared  their  purpose  of  devoting  themselves 
henceforth  to  the  service  of  God.  Augustine,  who  with 
his  friend  Alypiiis  was  moved  at  the  story,  went  into 
the  garden,  whither  Alypius  soon  followed  him. 
"What  are  we  doing?"  said  Augustine.  "Did  you 
not  hear  ?  The  ignorant,  the  unlearned,  carry  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  by  storm,  while  we,  with  our 
boasted  science,  grovel  on  the  earth.  Is  it  not  a  shame 
that  we  have  not  the  courage  to  imitate  them  V ' 
Abru]3tly  quitting  Alypius,  he  threw  himself  under  a 
fig-tree  and  began  to  weep  in  misery.  Suddenly  a 
child' s  voice  seemed  to  reach  him,  singing  and  rej)eating 
the  words,  "  Take  and  read  !"  These  words  appeared 
to  him  as  a  revelation  from  heaven.  Seizing  a  copy  of 
the  'New  Testament,  he  opened  on  the  passage,  "  Let 
us  walk  honestly,  as  in  the  day  ;  not  in  rioting  and 
drunkenness  ;  not  in  chambering  and  wantonness  ;  not 
in  strife  and  envyings.  But  put  ye  on  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  and  make  not  provision  for  the  flesh  to  fulfil 
the  lusts  thereof."  "Instantly,"'  he  says  himself,  at 
the  end  of  the  sentence,  "by  a  light,  as  it  were,  of 
serenity  infused  into  my  heart,  all  the  darkness  of 
doubt  vanished  away." 

Henceforth,  until  her  death,  a  spiritual  union  was 
added  to  the  natural  affection  subsisting  between  the 
now  happy  mother  and  her  transformed  son.  j\Iany 
were  the  conversations  about  high  and  heavenly  things 
which  they  enjoyed  together.  A  great  painter,  Ary 
Scheffer,  has  depicted  one  of  these  occasions  when 
Monica  and  Augustine  stood  together  at  a  window, 


LAST   DAYS   OF   MONICA.  107 

gazing  at  tlie  Tiber.  The  window  opened  upon  a  gar- 
den of  the  house  at  Ostia,  where  they  stayed.  They 
gazed  upon  the  historic  river  and  then  upward  at  the 
eternal  heavens.  "We  were  soaring,"  says  the  son, 
"  higher  yet  by  inward  musing,  and  discourse,  and  ad- 
miring Thy  works,  that  we  might  arrive  at  that  region 
of  never-failing  plenty,  where  Thou  feedest  Israel  for- 
ever with  the  food  of  truth.  .  .  .  We  were  saying 
then,  if  to  any  one  the  tumult  of  the  flesh  were 
hushed  ;  hushed  the  images  of  earth  and  waters,  and 
au' ;  hushed  also  the  poles  of  heaven  ;  yes,  the  very 
soul  hushed  to  herself,  and  so  by  not  thinking  on  self, 
did  surmount  self  ;  hashed  all  dreams  and  imaginary 
revelations  ;  every  tongue  and  every  sign,  and  whatso- 
ever exists  only  in  transition,  which  if  any  could  hear, 
all  are  saying,  '  We  made  not  ourselves,  but  He  made 
us  that  abidetliforemr  ; '  if,  then,  having  uttered  this, 
they  too  should  be  hushed,  and  He  alone  should  speak, 
not  through  any  tongue  of  flesh,  nor  angel's  voice,  nor 
sound  of  thunder,  nor  in  the  dark  riddle  of  a  simili- 
tude, but  so  that  we  might  hear  His  very  self  without 
these  (as  we  two  strained  ourselves,  and  in  swift 
thought  touched  on  that  eternal  wisdom  which  abideth 
over  all) ;  could  this  be  continued,  and  other  visions  far 
unlike  be  withdrawn,  and  this  one  absorb  and  ravish 
and  wrap  up  the  beholder  amid  these  inward  joys,  so 
that  life  might  be  forever  like  that  one  moment  of  un- 
derstanding which  now  we  sighed  after,  were  not  this — 
Bnter  into  tliy  Mastef  s  joy  f  And  when  shall  that 
be  ?"  "  Son,  for  my  part,"  said  Monica,  "  I  have  no 
further  delight  in  anything  in  this  life.  What  do  I 
here  any  longer,  or  to  what  end  I  am  here,  I  know  not. 


108  MONICA,   MOTHER   OF   ST.   AUGUSTINE. 

now  that  my  hopes  in  this  world  are  accomplished- 
One  thing  there  was  for  which  I  desired  to  linger  for 
a  while  in  this  life — that  I  might  see  thee  a  true  Chris- 
tian before  I  died.  My  God  hath  now  done  this  for  me 
more  abundantlj^,  that  I  now  see  thee,  despising  earthly 
ha|)piness,  become  His  servant.     What  do  I  here  ?" 

The  shadows  of  life's  evening  were  indeed  closing 
around  the  mother  of  Augustine.  About  five  days  after 
this  she  was  taken  with  a  fever,  and  said  to  him, 
"  Here  shall  you  bury  your  mother."  And  when  some 
lamented  that  she  was  about  to  die  so  far  from  her  old 
home  in  Africa,  she  meekly  answered,  "  Nothing  is  far 
to  God  ;  and  I  do  not  fear  that  He  should  not  know 
where  to  find  me  at  the  resurrection  morning." 

Matthew  Arnold  has  most  fittingly  depicted  in  verse 
the  last  words  of  Monica  : 

"  O  could  thy  grave  at  home,  at  Carthage,  be  ! 
Care  not  for  that,  and  lay  me  lohere  I  fall. 
Everywhere  heard  ioill  he  the  judgment  call. 
But  at  God's  altar,  0  rememher  me  I 

"  Thus  Monica,  and  died  in  Italy. 

Yet  fervent  had  her  longing  been,  through  all 
Her  course,  for  home  at  last  and  burial 
With  her  own  husband,  by  the  Libyan  Sea. 

"  Had  been,  but  at  the  end,  to  her  pure  soul 

All  life  with  all  beside  seemed  vain  and  cheap, 
And  union  before  God  the  only  care. 

"  Creeds  pass,  rites  change,  no  altar  standeth  whole  ; 
Yet  we  her  memory,  as  she  prayed,  will  keep, 
Keep  by  this  :  Life  in  Ood  and  union  there .'" 


DEATH    AND    BURIAL.  109 

"  I  closed  her  eyes,"  said  her  son,  "  and  there  flowed 
a  mighty  sorrow  into  my  heart.  O  my  God,  what 
comparison  is  there  between  the,  honor  that  I  paid  to 
her  and  her  slavery  for  me  ?  Being  then  forsaken  of  so 
great  comfort  in  her,  my  soul  was  wounded,  and  that 
life  rent  asunder,  as  it  were,  which,  of  hers  and  mine 
together,  had  been  made  but  one."  He  adds  subse- 
quently :  "  And  behold  the  corpse  was  carried  to  the 
burial.  \Ye  went  and  returned  without  tears.  And 
then  by  little  and  little  I  recovered  former  thoughts  of 
Thy  handmaid  :  her  holy  conversation  toward  Thee  ; 
her  holy  tenderness  and  observance  toward  us  ;  where- 
of I  was  suddenly  deprived." 

Such  was  the  mother  of  whom  Augustine,  to  the 
close  of  his  own  life,  declared,  "  It  is  to  my  mother  that 
I  owe  everything.  If  I  am  Thy  child,  O  my  God, 
it  is  because  Thou  gavest  me  such  a  mother.  If  I 
-pietev  the  truth  to  all  other  things,  it  is  the  point  of  my 
mothers  teaching.  If  I  did  not  long  ago  x^erish  in 
sin  and  misery,  it  is  because  of  the  long  and  faithful 
tears  with  which  she  j)leaded  for  me." 

Monica  may  well  stand  as  a  model  of  the  Christian 
mother  as  well  as  of  the  Christian  wife.  By  meekness, 
charity,  silence,  and  obedience  in  things  lawful,  she 
"  gained  her  husband,"  Patricius,  and  was  an  example 
of  St.  Paul's  saying,  "  The  believing  wife  sanctifieth  the 
unbelieving  husband."  By  prayer  and  patience  she 
won  her  great  son  Augustine  from  unbelief  and  sen- 
suality to  that  faith  and  self- consecration  which  made 
him  a  burning  and  shining  light  to  all  ages  of  the 
Church  and  of  the  world.  His  influence  upon  Chris- 
tian civilization  can  hardly  be  overestimated,  and  even 


110  MONICA,   MOTHER  OF   ST.  AUGUSTINE. 

to  the  present  time  he  still  bears  a  splendid  reputation 
as  an  interpreter  of  Scripture. 

It  is  to  the  great  credit  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  that  she  has  paid  due  honor  to  her  noble 
women.  St.  Monica  is  not  the  least  of  the  female 
saints  in  her  calendar,  and  a  special  day  and  special 
service  in  the  Breviary  commemorates  her  pure,  unself- 
ish, and  heroic  life. 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN'S  MOTHER. 

"  This  man,  whose  homely  face  you  look  upon, 
Was  one  of  Nature's  masterful,  great  men  ; 
Born  with  strong  arms  that  unfought  battles  won  ; 
Direct  of  speech  and  cunning  with  the  pen. 

"  Chosen  for  large  designs,  he  had  the  art 
Of  winning  with  his  humor,  and  he  went 
Straight  to  his  mark,  which  was  the  human  heart ; 
Wise,  too,  for  what  he  could  not  break  he  bent. 

"  Upon  his  back  a  more  than  Atlas  load. 

The  bui'den  of  the  commonwealth,  was  laid  ; 
He  stooped,  and  rose  up  to  it,  though  the  road 
Shot  suddenly  downward,  not  a  whit  dismayed. 

*'  Hold,  warriors,  councillors,  kings  ! — all  now  give  place 
To  this  dear  benefactor  of  the  race  !  " 

R.  H.  Stoddard. 

This  man,  of  whom  the  poet  writes  thus  touchingly, 
was  born  with  the  birthmark  of  sorrow  and  hopeless- 
ness upon  him,  and  there  is  no  subject  in  the  annals  of 
biography  more  touching,  more  pathetic,  than  Abraham 
Lincoln.  And  the  cause  of  this  is  not  due  wholly,  as 
many  have  asserted,  to  the  poverty  and  misery  of  his 
early  years  :  it  was  the  result  of  the  mental  condition 
of  his  mother.  To  know  him  aright  it  is  necessary  to 
study  her  life  in  detail,  and  the  difficulty  encountered 
in  the  iDursuit  of  such  knowledge  is  well-nigh  dis- 
couraging. 


112  ABRAHAM   LINCOLN'S   MOTHER. 

The  great  mothers  of  great  men  and  women  are  few 
in  number,  but  are  widely  known.     The  obscure  and 
comparatively  unknown  mothers  of  men  and  women 
of  genius  form  a  great   multitude  of  flitting  shadows 
whose  outlines  and  properties  are  not  easy  to  ascertain. 
Undoubtedly  these  unknown  mothers  must  have  had 
strong  characteristics,  or  they  could   not   have  trans- 
mitted  great   qualities   to   their   children.     It    is   the 
settled  opinion  of  physiologists  that  the  mother  has  a 
far  greater  influence  than  the  father  in  the  mental  and 
moral  qualities  of  the    offspring.     It  has  even    been 
maintained  that  no  great  man  has   ever  existed  who 
had  not  a  great  mother,  whether  she  was  known  to 
fame  as  great  or  not.     Mr.  James  Mill,  in  his  essay  on 
"Education,"    viewing    the    matter    physiologically, 
lays  down   the   principle   that   as   soon  as  the  infant 
begins    to   feel,    the   character  begins   to   l)e   formed, 
and  that   the   habits   which   are   then   contracted  are 
the  most  pervading  and  operative  of  all.    Many  French 
physiologists  of  eminence  hold  the  same  opinion,  and 
date  the  influence  of  the   mother  upon  the  character 
and    intellect    of    the    child    to   a   time   considerably 
anterior  to  its  ])irth.     No  one  will  deny  that  what  are 
called    "mother's    marks"    upon   a    child    are    often 
caused  by  her  condition  and  feelings  at  a  particular 
time.     A  sudden  shock,  such  as  the  tidings  that  her 
husband    has    met  A\ith    a  serious    accident    or  been 
killed,  will  almost  certainly  affect  her  condng  offspring 
for  life,  if  it  is  born  alive.     The  child  who,  but  for  this 
terrible  unhingement  of  his  mother's  nervous  system, 
would  have  been   distinguished  for  intelligence,  de- 
velops  very   soon   into   a  gibbering  idiot,    or  a  half- 


A   MOTHER'S   RESPONSIBILITY.  113 

witted  innocent,  incapable  of  doing  anything  service- 
able for  himself  or  others.  Sir  Walter  Scott,  in  "  The 
Fortunes  of  Nigel,"  states  that  the  extreme  dislike 
which  James  the  First  nourished  against  naked  steel, 
which  seemed  to  be  as  constitutional  as  his  timidity, 
was  usually  ascribed  to  the  brutal  murder  of  Rizzio 
having  been  perpetrated  in  his  unfortunate  mother's 
presence  before  he  was  bom. 

A  mother  who  j)rotects  herself,  on  the  other  hand, 
from  unseemly  spectacles,  and  who  keeps  her  thoughts 
in  calm  and  cheerful  currents,  will  bless  her  offspring 
with  a  happy  temperament.  The  contemplation  of 
beautiful  pictures,  of  fine,  natural  scenery,  or  of  pleas- 
ant external  surroundings,  will  favorably  mark  a 
child's  character  and  mould  its  features  in  harmony 
and  beauty. 

Whatever  the  mother  is  before  the  child  is  born  that 
will  it  be  when  it  enters  upon  its  earthly  career,  and  a 
more  important  subject  than  this  cannot  be  submitted 
to  the  contemplation  of  intelligent  people. 

It  is  most  undeniably  true  that  the  undertone  of  deep 
sorrow  in  Lincoln's  nature  was  directly  due  to  the 
hopeless  state  of  mind  in  which  his  mother  had  fallen 
jjrevious  to  his  birth.  She  was  in  poor  health,  and  it 
is  safe  to  say  was  a  disapj)ointed  wife,  overworked 
and  discouraged.  She  was  naturally  kind,  and  was 
morbidly  sensitive  to  the  sight  of  suffering  in  others. 
All  the  biographies  we  have  had  of  Lincoln  make  out 
his  father  to  have  been  an  unambitious,  easy-going, 
shiftless  man,  one  who  was  satisfied  with  shabby  sur- 
roundings, and  who  felt  no  great  responsibility  for 
others.     Zeal  in  any  direction  was  an  unknown  factor 


114  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN'S   MOTHER. 

in  liis  make-up,  and  it  was  an  impossibility  for  any 
woman,  even  the  most  devoted  of  wives,  to  feel  any 
pride  in  or  greatly  to  love  a  husband  who  was  so  in- 
different to  her  comfort  and  happiness. 

The  reserve  with  which  Lincoln  made  even  the  barest 
reference  to  his  early  youth  and  parentage,  and  the 
undisguised  look  of  sadness — almost  of  anguish — that 
overshadowed  his  countenance  when  questioned  as  to 
his  mother,  led  many  to  believe  that  there  was  some 
unhappy  mystery  connected  with  her  life,  and  his- 
torians have  not  been  wanting  who  liave  explained  his 
reluctance  to  dwell  upon  his  childhood  as  due  to  his 
illegitimacy.  Nothing  so  cruel  could  be  charged. 
The  cause  of  his  sorrow  was  deeper  than  any  knowl- 
edge that  came  to  him  after  he  grew  up  to  boyhood. 
It  was,  as  said,  the  impress  made  upon  him  before  he 
was  born  by  a  lonely-hearted,  long-suffering,  and  in- 
tensely nervous  nature — a  nature  silent  and  depressed, 
overwrought  and  dumb  from  the  pain  of  her  life.  She 
was  a  strangely  sad  woman,  and  during  the  later  years 
of  her  life  exhibited  a  shrinking  reserve,  in  striking 
contrast  to  the  gay  spirits  and  extreme  sociability  of 
her  nature  as  a  girl. 

The  impress  of  disapjoointment  and  sorrow  was  early 
made  upon  her  face,  and  her  little  son,  intensely  sym- 
pathetic as  he  was,  and  with  an  inherited  predisposi-' 
tion  to  gloomy  views  of  life,  early  took  on  a  like  ex- 
pression which  never  left  him. 

We  may  not  picture  the  influence  she  would  have 
exerted  upon  that  son  had  she  lived,  because  it  is  a 
diflBcult  as  it  is  a  profitless  task  to  draw  conclusions 
of  this  kind.     But  it  is  hardly  probable  that,  had  she 


A    WELL-ENDOWED    WOMAX.  115 

lived,  lier  life-lines  would  have  been  brighter,  and  it  is 
not  likely  that  she  would  ever  have  recovered  from  the 
loss  of  physical  energies  due  to  biting  poverty.  All 
her  early  ambition  was  dead,  and  the  years  to  come 
could  give  no  i)romise  of  lightened  cares  or  a  happier 
home. 

Mrs.  Lincoln,  whose  maiden  name  was  Nancy  Hanks, 
would  have  been,  under  other  and  haj)pier  circum- 
stances, a  noticeable  woman.  She  was  well  endowed, 
and  by  nature  possessed  of  many  excellent  qualities. 
She  had  a  limited  outlook  in  life,  but  considering  her 
surroundings  she  was  far  more  intelligent  than  the 
majority  of  those  about  her,  and  to  her  her  son  was  in- 
debted for  his  rare  intuitive  faculty  and  his  wonder- 
fully developed  sympathetic  nature.  Dr.  Holland  says 
of  her  :  "  She  had  much  in  her  nature  that  w^as  truly 
heroic,  and  much  that  shrank  from  the  rude  life  around 
her.  A  great  man  never  drew  his  infant  life  from  a 
purer  or  more  womanly  bosom  than  her  own." 

From  his  father  he  inherited  his  conversational 
habit,  for  he  was  an  inveterate  talker,  and  had  a  fund 
of  anecdote.  The  story-telling  propensity  of  the  former 
made  him  popular,  and  he  preferred  above  all  things 
to  sit  in  a  group  of  familiar  spirits  and  tell  jokes. 
Abraham  early  learned  this  accomplishment,  but  in 
his  case  it  was  indulged  in  more  to  mask  deep  feeling 
and  to  avoid  unpleasant  subjects  than  for  .the  j)leasure 
the  telling  of  stories  gave  him.  All  his  life  he  put 
barriers  between  the  world  and  himself  through  the 
medium  of  humor. 

The  one  excitement  of  Thomas  Lincoln's  life,  in 
which  he  periodically  indulged,  was  moving.     He  had 


116  ABRAHAM   LINCOLN  S   MOTHER. 

a  mania  for  changing  his  homes,  as  he  had  for  varying 
his  business  occupations.  He  did  both  whenever  the 
thought  occurred  to  him,  and  the  adage  of  the  rolling- 
stone  found  a  fitting  illustration  in  him.  He  was  a 
poor  workman,  and  made  little  headway  in  his  trade — 
that  of  carpentering.  With  even  a  superficial  knowl- 
edge of  this  trade,  it  would  be  supposed  that  he  would 
have  made  his  home  comfortable  ;  but  it  does  not  ap- 
pear that  he  ever  did  more  than  put  together  a  table  or , 
two  and  a  bedstead. 

The  charge  that  has  been  made  against  his  parents 
— that  they  were  never  married — does  great  injustice 
to  the  character  of  the  father  as  of  the  mother  of 
Abraham  Lincoln.  Mr.  Lincoln  was,  so  far  as  can  be 
learned,  a  strictly  moral  man,  and  his  wife  was  a  noble 
woman.  Testimony  sufficient  exists  to  have  prevented 
the  utterance  of  this  slander.  The  bond  given  by  him 
to  the  county  clerk  on  the  occasion  of  his  obtaining  a 
marriage  license  is  on  file  in  the  Washington  County, 
Kentucky,  Court-House.     It  reads  as  follows  : 

' '  Know  all  men  by  these  presents,  that  we,  Thomas 
Lincoln  and  Richard*  Berry,  are  held  and  firmly  bound 
unto  his  excellency  the  Governor  of  Kentucky  in  the 
just  sum  of  fifty  pounds,  current  money,  to  the  pay- 
ment of  which,  well  and  truly  to  be  made  to  the  said 
Governor  and  his  successors,  we  bind  ourselves,  our 
heirs,  etc.,  jointly  and  severally,  firmly  by  these  pres- 
ents, sealed  with  our  seals,  and  dated  this  10th  day  of 
June,  1806. 

' '  The  conditions  of  the  above  obligations  are  such 
that,  whereas,  there  is  a  marriage  shortly  intended  be- 


HER   MARRIAGE.  117 

tween  the  above  bound  Thomas  Lincoln  and  Nancy 
Hanks,  for  which  a  license  has  been  issued  ;  now,  if 
there  be  no  lawful  cause  to  obstruct  the  said  marriage, 
then  this  obligation  to  be  void,  else  to  remain  in  full 
force  and  virtue.  Thomas  Lincoln, 

Richard  Berry. 
"Witness  :  Moses  Rice." 

The  marriage  occurred  on  September  23d,  1806,  and 
the  ceremony  was  performed  by  the  Rev.  Mr.  Head,  an 
itinerant  Methodist  preacher.  This  same  preacher, 
who  was  a  cabinetmaker  in  Springfield,  Kentucky, 
preached  Mrs.  Lincoln's  funeral  sermon  years  after- 
ward. 

The  young  couple  were  poor,  but  very  pox^ular,  and 
among  the  neighbors  at  the  marriage  was  Judge  Felix 
Grundy,  who  subsequently  removed  to  Nashville, 
Tennessee,  and  became  Attorney- General  of  the  United 
States. 

A  venerable  citizen  of  Kentucky,  Dr.  C.  C.  Graham, 
of  Louisville,  in  a  letter  to  a  friend,  pays  this  tribute 
to  Mrs.  Lincoln : 

"  It  is  not  at  all  unlikely  that  our  great  and  good 
President  owed  his  great  qualities  of  head  and  heart 
to  Nancy  Hanks  Lincoln,  to  depreciate  whom  Messrs. 
Lamon  and  Herndon  have  done  their  utmost.  I  am 
acquainted  with  Dennis  Hanks,  and  find  a  very  de- 
cided resemblance  in  many  features  between  him  and 
President  Lincoln  ;  the  difference  being  in  greater 
massiveness  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  features,  not  in  their 
type.  The  mother  of  Abraham  Lincoln  is  entitled  to 
vindication    and     veneration     from    every    American 


118  ABRAHAM   LINCOLN'S   MOTHER. 

citizen  who  loves  his  country,  and  to  whom  the  fame 
and  glory  of  its  greatness  is  dear.  She  deserves  as 
well  and  is  entitled  to  as  much  honor  at  our  hands  as 
the  mother  of  Washington,  for  she  gave  us  as  great 
and  as  good  a  man.  Let  the  chivalry  of  every  true 
man  in  the  land  he  rescued  from  ruin  feel  and  resent 
as  a  personal  indignity  the  brutality  of  him  who  would 
endeavor  to  cast  a  reproach  upon  his  mother." 

Three  years  after  the  marriage  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Lin- 
coln their  only  son  Abraham  was  born,  on  the  12th  of 
February,  1809,  in  a  district  of  Hardin  County  now  in- 
cluded in  La  Rue  County.  Both  Thomas  Lincoln  and 
Nancy  Hanks  were  born  in  Virginia,  and  the  father  of 
Thomas  Lincoln  was  a  Pennsylvania  Quaker.  The 
little  boy  came  of  good  stock,  and  had  his  father  been 
an  energetic,  ambitious  man,  the  family  would  have 
been  far  differently  situated.  The  harshest  thing  that 
need  be  said  of  him  is  that  he  failed  to  realize  his  re- 
sponsibilities, and  ignored  them  to  an  extent  that  a 
more  enlightened  man  would  have  considered  criminal. 

Dickens  has  made  all  the  world  his  confidant  in  the 
particulars  of  his  poverty-stricken  and  unappreciated 
infancy  and  childhood.  Lincoln,  who  endured  ex- 
quisite anguish  on  the  same  account,  would  gladly  have 
died  and  made  no  sign  of  the  suffering  he  had  i^assed 
through.  The  long,  long  rainy  day  of  poverty  and 
want  did  not  end  with  him  as  with  the  novelist,  and 
he  had  not  the  pleasure  of  lifting  his  mother  from  her 
toils  and  burdens,  and  putting  her  where  she  would 
realize  the  happiness  she  deserved.  She  died  of  that 
most  terrible  enemy  of  the  poor,  consumption,  and  left 
her  desolate  little  boy  alone  in  his  misery  when  only 


>.  ■  ^«|^^|^^A""^^■ 


\-  ■  I 


MOTHER   OF    PRESIDENT   LINCOLN. 


TEACHING    HIS   SON.  121 

ten  years  old.  He  was  her  only  living  child,  and  about 
him  centred  every  ambition  of  her  dreary  life.  She 
could  read  and  write — an  accomj)lishment  which  her 
husband  did  not  possess— and  she  taught  her  little  child 
his  letters,  and  by  slow  degrees  to  learn  to  spell  and 
then  to  read.  It  was  an  absorbing  task  for  him,  for  the 
cabin  in  which  thev  lived  afforded  him  no  comforts, 
and  he  had  no  amusements.  His  mother's  attention, 
denied  him  too  much  because  of  the  hard  work  she 
performed,  was  the  sweetest  boon  he  coveted,  and  to 
lean  against  her  knee  or  to  sit  beside  her  and  labori- 
ously wrestle  with  the  sounds  of  letters  and  the  spell- 
ing of  words  was  a  priceless  pleasure  to  him. 

She  encouraged  and  praised  him,  and  pictured  the 
future  that  he  would  make  for  himself  wiien  he  grew 
to  be  a  man ;  and  the  little  child,  watching  her  sad 
face  and  listening  to  her  earnest  words,  did  not  know 
how  hard  it  was  for  her  to  make  him  understand  what 
his  mother  mshed  him  to  be,  mthout  telling  him  in  so 
many  words  how  unlike  he  must  be  to  his  father. 
She  had  a  morbid  fear  of  her  son  growing  up  to  idle- 
ness and  ignorance,  and  she  successfully  impressed 
upon  him  the  necessity  of  doing  some  particular  task 
in  nfe,  and  doing  it  well. 

Compared  to  the  mental  poverty  of  those  about  her, 
Mrs.  Lincoln  was  a  prodigy  of  learning,  and  her  hus^ 
band  and  relatives  were  alike  proud  of  her.  She  held 
herself  aloof  from  many  of  her  husband's  friends,  and 
had  he  possessed  a  tithe  of  her  pride  and  energy,  the 
early  home  of  the  future  President  of  the  United  States 
might  have  been  a  pleasant  memory  to  him  in  later 
years,  instead  of  a  depressing  and  sorrowful  recollec- 


122  ABRAHAM   LINCOLN'S   MOTHER. 

tion.  Had  Mrs.  Lincoln  lived,  her  child's  life  would 
have  been  different,  but  as  it  was,  she  laid  so  sure  a 
foundation  in  his  nature  that  he  owed  to  her,  more 
than  to  any  other  human  being,  his  finest  traits  of 
character. 

She  is  described  as  being,  at  the  time  of  her  mar- 
riage, a  "  slender,  symmetrical  woman  of  medium 
stature,  and  a  brunette,  with  dark  hair,  regular 
features,  and  soft,  sparkling  hazel  eyes."  Her  son 
could  not  have  recalled  her  by  this  description,  for 
when  he  was  old  enough  to  know  her,  her  form  was 
bent  with  hard  work  ;  and  but  for  the'  touchingly  sad 
exj^ression  on  her  faded  countenance  it  would  have 
been  hard  in  outline. 

She  died,  after  a  long  illness,  in  October,  1818,  and 
left  her  child  wretched,  not  only  in  feeling  but  in  con- 
dition. He  was  old  for  his  age,  and  during  her  pro- 
longed suffering  he  was  her  constant  attendant,  and 
while  her  greatest  comfort  was  at  the  same  time  her 
one  anxious  thought.  How  to  leave  him  alone  in  the 
world  was  the  added  anguish  of  her  dying  hours. 
Her  great  love  for  him,  and  his  clinging,  helpless  de- 
pendence upon  her,  his  sick  mother,  made  her  last 
days  pathetic  ;  and  their  sad  condition  has  been  fit- 
tingly expressed  by  Robert  Buchanan  in  these  fines  : 

"  Oh,  bairn,  when  I  am  dead, 

How  shall  ye  keep  frae  harm  ? 
"What  hand  shall  gie  ye  bread  ? 
What  fire  will  keep  ye  warm  ? 
How  shall  ye  dwell  on  earth  awa'  frae  me  ?" 
"  Oh,  mither,  dinna  dee  !" 


A  LONELY   CHILD.  123 

Oh,  bairn,  it  is  but  closing  up  the  eeu, 

And  lying  down  never  to  rise  again, 
Many  a  strong  man's  sleeping  hae  I  seen  ; 

There  is  nae  pain  ! 
I'm  weary,  weary,  and  I  scarce  ken  why  ; 

My  summer  has  gone  by. 
And  sweet  were  sleep  but  for  the  sake  o'  thee." 
"  Oh,  mither,  dinna  dee  !"' 


C( 


And  sweet  were  sleej)"  to  tliis  poor  weary  heart  if 
she  had  no  after-knowledge  of  how  her  son  was 
faring.  If  in  her  spirit  home  she  was  cognizant  of  the 
lonely,  neglected  child  in  that  dreary  Western  cabin, 
her  death  was  not  the  mercy  which  we  must  hope  it 
was.  Her  child  was  as  forsaken  as  a  motherless  boy's 
fate  could  be,  and  he  could  not  look  back  upon  that 
time,  to  the  latest  day  of  his  life,  without  emotion  and 
humiliation.  His  greatest  pleasure  was  found  in  the 
study  of  the  books  which  his  mother  had  taught  him  to 
read,  and  he  busied  himself,  when  opportunity  offered, 
with  practising  writing,  which  he  had  learned  with 
great  difficulty.  He  could  write  with  tolerable  success 
before  his  mother  died,  and  when  she  had  been  gone 
nearly  a  year  he  used  his  knowledge  of  penmanship  to 
secure  a  tribute  to  her  memory  which  had  been 
neglected  by  others. 

When  Mrs.  Lincoln  died  there  was  no  funeral  cere- 
mony, and  the  child,  perhax)s  inspired  by  others,  wrote 
to  the  minister  who  had  performed  the  marriage  cere- 
mony for  his  parents,  and  asked  him  to  preach  his 
mother's  funeral. 

Time  passed,  and  it  was  quite  three  months  before 
Mr.  Head  appeared  in  response  to  the  appeal.     The 


124  ABRAHAM   LINCOLN'S  MOTHER. 

funeral  was  preached  over  her  grave  in  the  presence  of 
the  father  and  son  and  a  gathering  of  about  twenty  of 
the  neighbors,  and  in  the  course  of  his  remarks  the 
I)reacher  referred  to  the  son's  share  in  securing  this 
tribute  to  his  mother's  memory.  And  little  Abe's 
filial  conduct  was  favorably  commented  upon  by  the 
neighbors. 

The  loneliest  year  of  his  life  had  scarcely  passed 
when  the  boy's  father  married  again,  and  his  mother's 
place  was  taken  by  a  kind-hearted  woman  who  bright- 
ened the  child's  existence  from  the  day  she  set  foot 
into  the  cheerless  cabin  of  Thomas  Lincoln.  She  took 
an  instant  and  especial  liking  to  the  neglected  boy, 
and  won  in  return  his  permanent  affection. 

******* 

Mrs.  Johnston,  Thomas  Lincoln's  second  wife,  was 
a  Avidow,  whom  he  had  known  when  they  were  both 
children  in  Kentucky,  and  she  went  with  him  to  his 
Western  home,  carrying  with  her  a  son  and  two 
daughters  of  her  own.  She  opened  her  heart  to  the 
ragged  little  boy,  who  gladly  welcomed  her  cheerful 
presence  to  his  comfortless  home. 

Her  picture  presented  in  these  pages  rejiresents  her 
in  her  later  life,  but  when  Abraham  Lincoln  first  saw 
her  she  was  young  and  cheerful,  and  full  of  energy 
and  determination.  It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  he 
loved  her  so  warmly.  She  made  his  hard  life  easier, 
and  her  influence  over  his  father  greatly  improved  the 
aspect  of  affairs  at  home.  Mrs.  Lincoln  was  as  ener- 
getic and  industrious  as  her  husband  was  otherwise, 
and  she  had  a  difficult  task  before  her  when  she  mar- 
ried.    She  had  been  greatly  disappointed  in  her  new 


A  STEPMOTHER.  125 

home,  having  been  led  to  believe  that  Mr.  Lincoln  was 
a  well-to-do  farmer  in  Indiana,  whereas  he  was  not  a 
farmer,  but  lived  in  great  poverty,  and  gained  what 
little  support  he  made  by  doing  odd  jobs  and  working 
for  the  surrounding  farmers, 

Mrs.  Lincoln's  fondness  for  the  tender-hearted, 
lonely  little  boy  enabled  her  to  read  his  character 
speedily,  and  she  soon  discovered  that  he  had  much 
natural  ability  and  a  strong  desire  to  learn.  As  he 
grew  older  she  said  of  him  that  "  he  read  every  book 
he  could  lay  his  hand  on,  and  when  he  came  across  a 
passage  that  struck  him,  he  would  write  it  dowTi  on 
boards  if  he  had  no  paper,  and  keep  it  there  until  he 
did  get  paper.  Then  he  would  rewrite  it,  look  at  it, 
repeat  it.  He  had  a  copy-book,  a  kind  of  scrap-book, 
in  which  he  put  down  all  things,  and  thus  preserved 
them." 

Mrs.  Lincoln  must  have  been  a  wise  mother,  be- 
cause she  successfully  managed  her  own  children  and 
her  stepson,  and  the  affectionate  relations  existing  be- 
tween them  were  remarkable.  There  was  nothing  that 
Abe  would  not  do  for  his  half-sisters  or  his  mother, 
and  they  in  turn  gave  him  the  tenderest  affection. 

These  daughters,  after  they  were  grown  up  and 
married,  made  their  new  homes  Abe's,  and  he  was 
better  loved  by  them  than  was  their  own  brother,  a 
young  man  who  gave  his  mother  much  trouble. 

The  daughters,  when  speaking  of  their  distinguished 
stepbrother  after  his  tragic  death,  invariably  referred 
to  his  affection  for  their  mother,  and  of  how  worthy 
she  was  of  every  one's  love.  Lincoln's  youth  was 
brightened  by  her  companionship,   and  when  he  left 


1-40  ABRAHAM   LINCOLN'S   MOTHER. 

home,  at  the  age  of  twenty-one,  to  care  for  himself, 
the  i)ain  he  felt  was  in  leaving  his  stepmother. 

The  first  money  he  earned  he  sent  her  a  share  of  it, 
and  as  long  as  she  lived  he  continued  to  provide  for 
her  comfort,  though  much  of  the  money  he  sent  was 
used  by  those  who  lived  on  her  kindness  and  imposed 
ui^on  her  generosity. 

From  the  time  Lincoln  left  his  father's  service,  he 
never  returned  to  his  home  to  stay.  During  his  life  at 
home  his  aspirations  were  chilled  and  his  ambition 
curbed  by  the  work  that  was  j)^^t  before  him,  and  the 
poverty  of  his  family,  which  grieved  him  deeply. 

Twice  only  during  his  father's  life  did  he  visit  his 
home,  but  when  his  father  died  he  wrote  kindly  to  his 
stepbrother,  who  had  informed  him  of  the  event.  He 
was  unable  to  see  his  mother  at  the  time  because  of 
illness  in  his  own  household,  but  when  he  was  elected 
President  of  the  United  States  he  went  to  see  her.  Mr. 
Lamon  thus  describes  this  last  reunion  : 

' '  It  was  all  very  pleasant  to  Mr.  Lincoln  to  see  such 
multitudes  of  familiar  faces  smiling  upon  his  wonder- 
ful successes.  But  the  chief  object  of  his  solicitude 
w^as  not  here  ;  Mrs.  Lincoln  lived  in  the  southern  part 
of  the  county,  and  he  was  all  impatience  to  see  her. 
As  soon,  therefore,  as  he  had  taken  a  frugal  breakfast 
with  Dennis  (Hanks),  he  and  Colonel  Chapman  started 
off  in  a  '  two-horse  buggy '  toward  Farmington,  where 
his  stepmother  was  living  with  her  daughter,  Mrs. 
Moore.  They  had  much  difficulty  in  crossing  '  the 
Kickapoo '  river,  which  was  running  full  of  ice  ;  but 
they  finally  made  the  dangerous  passage  and  arrived 
at  Farmington  in  safety. 


FINAL   FAREWELLS.  127 


(( 


Tlie  meeting  between,  liim  and  the  old  lady  was  of 
a  most  affectionate  and  tender  character.  She  fondled 
him  as  her  own  '  Abe,'  and  he  her  as  his  own  mother. 
It  was  soon  arranged  that  she  should  return  with  him 
to  Charleston,  so  that  they  might  enjoy  by  the  way  the 
unrestricted  and  uninterruj)ted  intercourse  w^hich  they 
both  desired  above  all  things,  but  which  they  were  not 
likely  to  have  where  the  people  could  get  at  him.  .  .  . 
The  parting  between  Mr.  Lincoln  and  his  mother  was 
very  touching.  She  embraced  him  with  deep  emotion, 
and  said  she  was  sure  she  would  never  behold  him 
again,  for  she  felt  that  his  enemies  would  assassinate 
him.  He  rei3lied,  '  No,  no,  mamma  ;  they  will  not  do 
that.  Trust  in  the  Lord,  and  all  will  be  well ;  we  will 
see  each  other  again.'  " 

The  fear  expressed  by  his  stepmother  had  been  im- 
pressed upon  her  from  the  time  of  his  election,  and  it 
was  generally  shared  in  by  her  family  and  neighbors. 
She  never  saw  him  again.  In  her  interview  with  Mr. 
Herndon,  after  the  assassination,  she  sj^oke  of  him 
with  a  voice  broken  with  emotion.  "  Abe  was  a  poor 
boy,"  said  she,  "and  I  can  say  what  scarcely  one 
M^oman — a  mother — can  say  in  a  thousand.  Abe  never 
gave  me  a  cross  word  or  look,  and  never  refused,  in 
fact  or  appearance,  to  do  anything  I  requested.  I 
never  gave  him  a  cross  word  in  all  my  life.  .  .  .  His 
mind  and  mine — what  little  I  had — seemed  to  run 
together.  ...  He  was  here  after  he  was  elected  Presi- 
dent." (At  this  point  the  aged  speaker  turned  away 
to  weejD,  and  then,  wiping  her  eyes  with  her  apron, 
went  on  with  the  story.)  "  He  was  dutiful  to  me 
always.      I  think  he  loved  me  truly.     I  had  a  son 


128  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN'S   MOTHER. 

Jolm,  who  was  raised  with  Abe.  Both  were  good 
boys  ;  but  I  must  say,  both  now  being  dead,  that  Abe 
w^as  the  best  boy  I  ever  saw,  or  expect  to  see.  I  wish 
I  had, died  when  my  husband  died.  I  did  not  want 
Abe  to  run  for  President  ;  did  not  want  him  elected  ; 
was  afraid,  somehow — felt  in  my  heart  ;  and  wdien  he 
came  down  to  see  me,  after  he  was  elected  President,  I 
still  felt  that  something  told  me  that  something  would 
befall  Abe,  and  that  I  should  see  him  no  more." 
AVhen  Mr.  Herndon  rose  to  go,  her  eyes  were  filled 
with  tears,  and  wringing  his  hands  as  if  loath  to  part 
with  one  who  talked  so  much  of  her  beloved  Abe,  she 
said,  "  Good-by,  my  good  son's  friend,  farewell." 

Kind  to  both  mothers,  and  loving  the  stepmother 
dearly  because  he  received  from  her  hands  the  daily 
comforts  of  life  and  the  companionshij)  a  nature  so 
like  his  required,  he  was  yet  the  likeness  in  spirit  and 
purpose  of  his  own  mother.  Her  sadness  of  heart 
covered  his  as  a  pall  at  intervals  all  his  life,  and  her 
stifled  ambition  found  its  fullest  exi^ression  in  him. 
It  seems  a  cruel  wrong  to  deny  to  Abraham  Lincoln's 
fame  the  influence  of  his  mothers  character  upon  his 
own,  or  to  withhold  from  hers  that  which  is  her  due — 
file  acknowledgment  that  his  best  qualities  w^ere  in- 
herited from  her.  Had  she  no  other  title  to  homage  as 
the  mother  of  Lincoln,  the  one  fact  that  she  instilled 
into  him  while  yet  a  little  child  the  traits  that  dis- 
tinguished him  as  a  man,  and  endeared  him  to  his 
kind,  should  give  her  rank  with  the  noblest  mothers  of 
America. 


CHAELES  DICKENS^  S  MOTHER. 

The  early  life  of  Charles  Dickens  was  not  a  happy 
one,  although  it  is  typical  of  the  lives  of  many  hun- 
dreds of  children,  especially  of  the  class  in  life  to  which 
he  belonged.  The  great,  perhaps  the  greatest  of 
modern  humorists  and  story  writers  was  born  at  Land- 
port,  in  Portsea,  on  Friday,  the  7th  day  of  February, 
1812.  His  father,  Mr.  John  Dickens,  was  a  clerk  in 
the  navy  pay-office,  and  was  at  that  time  stationed  in 
Portsmouth  dockyard.  He  formed  the  acquaintance 
of  Elizabeth  Barrow,  who  afterward  became  his  wife, 
through  her  elder  brother,  Thomas  Barrow,  who  was 
also  engaged  on  the  establishment  at  Somerset  House  ; 
and  she  bore  him  in  all  a  family  of  eight  children,  of 
whom  two  died  in  infancy.  The  eldest,  Fanny,  born 
in  1810,  was  followed  by  Charles,  entered  on  the  bap- 
tismal register  of  Portsea  as  Charles  John  Huffham, 
though  on  very  rare  occasions,  when  he  used  his  full 
name,  he  spelled  the  last  name  Huffam.  In  "  David 
Copperfield,"  which  was  largely  autobiographical,  or, 
at  least,  reminiscent  of  Charles  Dickens's  own  child- 
hood and  youth,  he  represents  himself  as  seeing  so  far 
back  into  the  blank  of  his  infancy  as  to  discern  therein 
his  mother  and  her  servant,  dwarfed  to  his  sight  by 
stooping  down  or  kneeling  on  the  floor,  and  himself 
going  unsteadily  from  one  to  the  other.  ''  If  it  should 
appear,"  he  adds,  "from  anything  I  may  set  down  in 


130  CHAELES   DICKENS'S  MOTHER. 

this  narrative,  tliat  I  was  a  child  of  close  observation, 
or  that  as  a  man  I  have  a  strong  memory  of  my  child- 
hood, I  undoubtedly  lay  claim  to  both  of  these  char- 
acteristics." Upon  which,  John  Forster,  his  biog- 
rajoher,  remembers  :  "  Applicable  as  this  might  be  to 
David  Copperfield,  it  was  simply  and  unaffectedly  true 
of  Charles  Dickens.'"  This  faithful  friend  of  Dickens 
and  his  children,  whose  death  occurred  so  soon  after 
his  own,  adds,  as  a  reminiscence  of  his  own,  that 
Dickens  had  often  told  him  that  he  remembered  the 
small  front  garden  to  the  house  at  Portsea,  from  which 
he  was  taken  away  when  he  was  two  years  old,  and 
where,  watched  by  a  nurse  through  a  low  kitchen  win- 
dow, almost  level  with  the  gravel  walk,  he  trotted 
about  with  something  to  eat,  and  his  little  elder  sister 
with  him. 

When  John  Dickens,  his  father,  was  again  brought 
nj>  by  his  duties  to  London  from  Portsmouth,  Charles 
Dickens  remembered  that  it  was  snowing  hard  when 
they  left  Portsea.  At  this  time  he  was  but  two  years 
old.  About  two  years  after  this  their  home  was  again 
changed,  his  father  being  placed  on  duty  in  Chatham 
dockyard. 

It  was  in  Chatham  that  he  received  the  most  durable 
of  his  early  impressions,  and  to  whose  surroundings  we 
owe  so  much  of  the  scenery  as  well  as  so  many  of  the 
types  of  character  in  "  Copperfield"  and  others  of  his 
works. 

"  The  associations,"  says  John  Forster,  "  that  were 
around  him  when  he  died  were  those  which  at  the 
outset  of  his  life  had  affected  him  most  strongly.  The 
house    called  Gadshill  Place  stands    on  the  strip   of 


A   QUEER   SMALL   BOY.  131 

highest  ground  in  the  main  road  between  Rochester 
and  Gravesend.  Often  had  we  travelled  past  it  to- 
gether years  and  years  before  it  became  his  home,  and 
never  without  some  allusion  to  what  he  told  me  when 
I  first  saw  it  in  his  company,  that  amid  the  recollections 
connected  with  his  childhood  it  held  always  a  promi- 
nent place,  for,  upon  first  seeing  it  as  he  came  from 
Chatham  with  his  father,  and  looking  up  at  it  with 
much  admiration,  he  had  been  promised  that  he  might 
himself  live  in  it,  or  in  some  such  house,  when  he  came 
to  be  a  man,  if  he  would  only  work  hard  enough,  which 
for  a  long  time  was  his  ambition.  The  story  is  a 
pleasant  one,  and  receives  authentic  confirmation  at  the 
opening  of  one  of  his  essays  on  travelling  abroad,  when, 
as  he  passes  along  the  road  to  Canterbury,  there 
crosses  it  a  vision  of  his  former  self. 

"  '  "  So  smooth  was  the  old  high  road,  and  so  fresh 
were  the  horses,  and  so  fast  went  I,  that  it  was  mid- 
way between  Gravesend  and  Rochester,  and  the  widen- 
ing river  was  bearing  the  ships,  white-sailed  or  black- 
smoked,  out  to  sea,  when  I  noticed  by  the  wayside  a 
very  queer  small  boy. 

"  '  "Halloa  !"  said  I  to  the  very  queer  small  boy, 
"  where  do  you  live  ?" 

At  Chatham, "  says  he. 

What  do  you  do  there  ?"  says  I. 

I  go  to  school, "  says  he. 

I  took  him  up  in  a  moment,  and  we  went  on. 
Presently  the  very  queer  small  boy  says,  "  This  is 
Gadshill  we  are  coming  to,  where  Falstaff  went  out  to 
rob  those  travellers,  and  ran  away." 

"  '  "  You  know  something  about  Falstaff,  eh  ?"  said  I. 


a  c  a 


132  CHARLES   DICKENS'S   MOTHER. 


a  i  u 


All  about  him,''  said  the  very  queer  small  boy. 
"  I  am  old  (I  am  nine),  and  I  read  all  sorts  of  books. 
But  do  let  us  stop  at  the  top  of  the  hill,  and  look  at 
the  house  there,  if  you  please." 

"  '  "  You  admu-e  that  house  ?"  said  I. 

"  '  "  Bless  you,  sir,"  said  the  very  queer  small  boy, 
*'  when  I  was  not  more  than  half  as  old  as  nine,  it  used 
to  be  a  treat  for  me  to  be  brought  to  look  at  it.  And 
now  I  am  nine,  I  come  by  myself  to  look  at  it.  And 
ever  since  I  can  recollect,  my  father,  seeing  me  so  fond 
of  it,  has  often  said  to  me,  'If  you  were  to  he  very 
persevermg  and  were  to  worTi  Jiard,  you  migTit  some 
day  come  to  line  in  it.''  Though  that's  impossible  !" 
said  the  very  queer  small  boy,  drawing  a  low  breath, 
and  now  staring  at  the  house  out  of  the  window  with 
all  his  might. 

"  '  I  was  rather  amazed  to  be  told  this  by  the  very 
queer  small  boy  ;  for  that  house  happens  to  be  my 
house,  and  I  have  reason  to  believe  that  what  he  said 
was  true.' 

*'  It  will  not  appear,"  says  Forster,  "  as  my  narra- 
tive moves  on,  that  he  owed  much  to  his  parents,  or 
was  other  than  in  his  first  letter  to  Washington  Irving 
he  described  himself  to  have  been,  "  a  very  small  and 
not  over-particularly-taken-care-of  boy  ; '  but  he  has 
frequently  been  heard  to  say  that  his  first  desire  for 
knowledge  and  his  earliest  passion  for  reading 
were  awakened  by  his  mother,  who  taught  him  the 
iirst  rudiments  not  only  of  English,  but  also,  a  little 
later,  of  Latin.  I  once  put  to  him  a  question  in  con- 
nection with  this,  to  which  he  replied  in  almost  exactly 
the  words  he  placed  five  years  later  in  the  mouth  of 


DAVID  COPPERFIELD.  133 

David  Copperfield  :  '  I  faintly  remember  her  teacliiiig 
me  the  alphabet  ;  and  when  I  look  upon  the  fat  black 
letters  in  the  i3rimer,  the  puzzling  novelt}"  of  their 
shapes,  and  the  easy  good  nature  of  0  and  S,  always 
seem  to  present  themselves  before  me  as  they  used  to 
do.'  " 

If  his  mother  taught  him  to  read,  his  father  soon 
gave  him  an  opportunity  of  gratifying  his  taste  for 
reading,  especially  of  the  romantic  kind.  We  have  the 
l^ositive  assertion  of  Mr.  Forster  that  the  following 
description  in  "  David  Copperfield"  was  literally  true 
of  its  author,  and  that  every  word  of  this  jDersonal 
recollection  had  been  written  down  as  fact,  some  years 
before  it  found  its  way  into  that  novel,  the  otily  change 
being  the  omission  of  the  name  of  the  cheap  series  of 
novelists  then  in  course  of  publication,  which  his 
father  also  numbered  among  his  literary  treasures. 

"  My  father  had  left  a  small  collection  of  books  in  a 
little  room  upstairs  to  which  I  had  access  (for  it  adjoined 
my  own),  and  which  nobody  else  in  our  house  ever 
troubled.  From  that  blessed  little  room,  '  Roderick 
Random,'  '  Peregrine  Pickle,'  '  Humphrej^  Clinker," 
'Tom  Jones,'  'The  Vicar  of  Wakefield,'  'Don 
Quixote,'  'Gil  Bias,'  and  'Robinson  Crusoe '  came 
out,  a  glorious  host,  to  keep  me  company.  They  kept 
alive  my  fancy  and  my  hope  of  something  beyond  that 
time  and  place — they  and  the  '  Arabian  Nights '  and 
the  'Tales  of  the  Genii,' — and  did  me  no  harm;  for 
whatever  harm  was  in  some  of  them  was  not  there  for 
me  ;  I  knew  nothing  of  it.  It  is  astonishing  to  me 
now  how  I  found  time,  in  the  midst  of  my  porings  and 
l)liinderings   over  heavier  themes,  to  read  those  books 


134  CHARLES   DICKENS'S   MOTHER. 

as  I  did.  It  is  curious  to  me  how  I  could  ever  have 
consoled  myself  under  small  troubles  (which  were  great 
troubles  to  me)  by  imjDersonating  my  favorite  char- 
acters in  them.  ...  I  have  been  Tom  Jones  (a  child' s 
Tom  Jones,  a  harmless  creature)  for  a  week  together. 
1  have  sustained  my  own  idea  of  Roderick  Random  for 
a  month  at  a  stretch,  I  verily  believe.  I  had  a  greedy 
relish  for  a  few  volumes  of  voyages  and  travels.  I  for- 
get what  more  that  were  on  those  shelves  ;  and  for 
days  and  days  I  can  remember  to  have  gone  about  my 
region  of  our  house,  armed  with  the  centre-piece  out  of 
an  old  set  of  boot-trees,  the  perfect  realization  of  Cap- 
tain Somebody,  of  the  Royal  British  Navy,  in  danger  of 
being  beset  by  savages,  and  resolved  to  sell  his  life  at  a 
great  price.  .  .  .  When  I  think  of  it,  the  picture 
always  rises  in  my  mind,  of  a  summer  evening,  the 
boys  at  play  in  the  churchyard,  and  I  sitting  on  my 
bed,  reading  as  if  for  life.  Every  barn  in  the  neighbor- 
hood, every  stone  in  the  church,  and  every  foot  of  the 
churchyard,  had  some  association  of  its  own  in  my 
mind  connected  with  these  books,  and  stood  for  some 
locality  made  famous  in  them.  1  had  seen  Tom  Piper 
go  climbing  up  the  church-steeple  ;  I  had  watched 
Strap,  with  the  knapsack  on  his  back,  stopping  to  rest 
himself  upon  the  wicket  gate  ;  and  I  know  that  Com- 
modore Trunnion  held  that  club  with  Mr.  Pickle  in  the 
Xmrlor  of  our  little  village  alehouse.'' 

Dickens  was  not  much  more  than  nine  years  old 
when  his  father  was  recalled  from  Chatham  to  Somerset 
House,  and  he  had  to  leave  his  kind  schoolmaster,  the 
Rev.  Mr.  Giles,  a  young  Baptist  minister,  and  all  the 
old  scenes  which  he  loved  so  dearly  to  the  last  hour  of 


AX   APPRENTICESHIP  OF  POVERTY.  135 

his  life.  He  was  to  be  torn  away  from  the  boys'  play- 
ground near  Clover  Lane,  in  Chatham,  where  the 
school-house  stood,  and  where  he  had  been  in  the  hay- 
maldng  time,  "  delivered  from  the  dangers  of  Seringa- 
X)atam,  an  immense  pile  [of  hay-cocks],  by  his  country- 
men the  victorious  British  (boy  next  door  and  his  two 
cousins),  and  had  been  recognized  with  ecstasy  by  his 
affianced  one  ('  Miss  Green '),  who  had  come  all  the  way 
from  England  (second  house  in  the  terrace)  to  ransom 
and  marry  him."  "  The  gay,  bright  regiments  always 
going  and  coming,  the  continual  paradings  and  firings, 
the  successions  of  sham  sieges  and  sham  defences,  the 
plays  got  up  by  his  cousin  in  the  hospital,  the  navy- 
pay  yacht  in  which  he  had  sailed  to  Sheerness  with  his 
father,  and  the  ships  floating  out  in  the  midway,  with 
their  far  visions  of  sea — he  was  to  leave  them  all." 

Meanwhile  he  was  now  not  only  to  serve  himself  a 
bitter  apiDrenticeship  to  x)overty  and  neglect,  but  to 
learn  for  the  first  time  his  father' s  financial  insolvency, 
which  he  has  depicted  both  in  Micawber's  character  and 
in  that  of  the  father  of  the  Marshalsea.  Mrs.  Micaw- 
ber  is  supposed  to  be  a  counterfeit  presentment  of  his 
mother.  On  one  occasion  he  gave  Mr.  Forster  a  sketch 
of  the  character  of  his  father.  "  I  know  my  father  to 
be  as  kind-hearted  and  generous  a  man  as  ever  lived  in 
the  world.  Everything  that  I  can  remember  of  his 
conduct  to  his  wife,  or  children,  or  friends  in  sickness 
or  affliction,  is  beyond  all  praise.  By  me  as  a  sick  child 
he  has  watched  night  and  day,  unweariedly  and  pa- 
tiently, many  nights  and  days.  He  never  undertook 
any  business,  charge  or  trust,  that  he  did  not  zealously, 
conscientiously,  punctually,  honorably  discharge.     His 


136  CHARLES   DICKENS'S  MOTHER. 

industry  has  always  been  untiring.  He  was  proud  of 
me  in  Ms  way,  and  had  a  great  admiration  of  my  comic- 
singing.  But,  in  the  ease  of  his  temper,  and  the 
straitness  of  his  means,  he  appeared  to  have  utterly 
lost  at  this  time  the  idea  of  educating  me  at  all,  and  to 
have  utterly  put  from  him  the  notion  that  I  had  any 
claim  upon  him,  in  that  regard,  whatever.  I  degen- 
erated into  cleaning  his  boots  of  a  morning  and  my 
own,  and  making  myself  useful  in  the  work  of  the 
little  house,  and  looking  after  my  younger  brothers 
and  sisters  {we  were  now  six  in  all),  and  going  on 
such  poor  errands  as  arose  out  of  our  poor  way  of  liv- 
mg. 

He  paid  visits  at  this  time  to  his  bachelor  uncle,  his 
mother's  elder  brother,  who. was  a  fellow  clerk  with  his 
father  in  Somerset  House.  This  Mr.  Thomas  Barrow 
had  broken  his  leg  in  a  fall,  and  little  Charles  Dickens 
used  to  carry  many  messages  to  him  from  his  sister  and 
brother-in-law,  the  boy's  mother  and  father.  Things 
had  come  to  such  a  pass  with  them  that  it  was  resolved 
to  try  the  experiment  of  his  mother  opening  a  school. 
"  The  time  was  arrived  for  her  to  exert  herself,"  she 
said,  "  and  she  must  do  something." 

A  house  was  found  in  North  Grover  Street,  and  a 
large  brass  plate  on  the  door  announced  "  Mrs. 
Dickens's  Establishment."  "  I  left,"  writes  Dickens, 
"  at  a  great  many  other  doors,  a  great  many  circulars 
calling  attention  to  the  merits  of  the  establishment. 
Yet  nobody  ever  came  to  school,  nor  do  I  recollect  that 
anybody  ever  proposed  to  come,  or  that  the  least 
preparation  was  made  to  receive  anybody.  But  I  know 
that  we  got  on  very  badly  with  the  butcher  and  baker  ; 


IN   A   BLACKING    WAREHOUSE.  137 

that  very  often  we  had  not  too  much  for  dinner,  and 
that  at  last  my  father  was  arrested." 

It  was  two  or  three  years  before  "  David  CopiDerfield" 
was  even  thought  of,  that  Dickens  recorded  his  first 
visit  to  his  father  in  the  debtors'  prison,  "  My  father 
was  waiting  for  me  in  the  lodge,  and  we  went  np  to  his 
room  (on  the  toj)  story  but  one),  and  cried  very  much. 
And  he  told  me,  I  remember,  to  take  warning  by  the 
Marshalsea,  and  to  observe  that  if  a  man  had  twenty 
pounds  a  year  and  sj^ent  nineteen  pounds  nineteen  shil- 
lings and  sixpence,  he  would  be  happy  ;  but  that  a 
shilling  spent  the  other  way  would  make  him  \vretched. 
I  see  the  fire  we  sat  before  now,  with  two  bricks  in- 
side the  rusted  grate,  one  on  each  side,  to  prevent  its 
burning  too  many  coals.  Some  other  debtor  shared  the 
room  with  him,  who  came  in  by  and  by."  And  he 
went  home  to  his  mother  to  comfort  her  wdth  an  ac- 
count of  his  visit. 

His  father  and  mother  now  accepted  the  offer  made 
for  him  by  a  relative  of  his  mother's,  that  he  should  go 
to  work  at  a  blacking  warehouse  at  six  shillings  a 
week.  "  It  is  wonderful  to  me  how  I  could  have  been 
so  easily  cast  away  at  such  an  age."  (He  was  now  ten 
years  old.)  "  It  is  wonderful  to  me  that,  even  after  my 
descent  into  the  poor  little  drudge  I  had  been  since  we 
came  to  London,  no  one  had  compassion  enough  on  me 
— a  child  of  singular  abilities,  quick,  eager,  delicate, 
and  soon  hurt,  bodily  or  mentally— to  suggest  that 
something  might  have  been  spared,  as  certainly  it 
might  have  been,  to  place  me  at  any  common  school. 
Our  friends,  I  take  it,  were  tired  out.  Xo  one  made 
any  sign.     ]SIy  father  and  mother  were  quite  satisfied. 


138  CHARLES    DICKENS'S    MOTHER. 

They  could  hardly  have  been  more  so  if  I  had  been 
twenty  years  of  age,  distinguished  at  a  grammar  school, 
and  going  to  Cambridge. ' ' 

His  father  failed  to  i^ropitiate  his  creditors,  every- 
thing they  had  was  either  pawned  or  sold,  and  his 
mother  had  to  break  up  her  "  Establishment"  in  North 
Grover  Street  and  go  with  her  children  to  live  with  her 
father  in  the  Marshalsea.  Charles,  however,  "  was 
handed  over  as  a  lodger  to  a  reduced  old  lady,  who 
took  children  in  to  board"  — the  original  of  Mrs. 
Pipchin  in  "  Dombey  and  Son." 

The  relative  who  rnled  the  blacking  shop  quarrelled 
with  his  father,  and  Charles  Dickens  was  discharged. 
His  father  was  now '^' whitewashed"  in  the  Insolvent 
Court,  and  out  of  prison.  The  family  were  all  living 
with  Mrs.  Pipchin,  whose  name  was  Roy  lance.  "  My 
mother,"  he  writes,  "set  herself  to  accommodate  the 
quarrel,  and  did  so  next  day.  She  brought  home  a  re- 
quest for  me  to  return  next  morning,  and  a  high  char- 
acter of  me,  which  I  am  very  sure  I  deserved.  My 
father  said  I  should  go  back  no  more,  and  should  go  to 
school.  I  do  not  write  resentfully  or  angrily  ;  for  I 
know  how  all  these  things  had  worked  together  to 
make  me  what  I  am,  but  I  never  afterward  forgot,  I 
never  shall  forget,  I  never  can  forget,  that  my  mother 
was  warm  for  my  being  sent  back." 

It  is  a  relief  to  turn  from  the  sorrows  and  humilia- 
tions of  the  sensitive  child,  so  little  appreciated  even  by 
his  mother,  to  the  successful  man  and  famous  author 
who  made  it  one  of  his  first  cares  to  provide  a  home  for 
his  father  and  mother.  "  I  took  a  little  house  for  them 
this  morning, ' '  he  writes  from  Exeter,  on  the  5th  of 


A   HOME   FOR  HIS  PARENTS.  139 

March,  1839,  "  and  if  they  are  not  pleased  with  it  I 
shall  be  grievously  disappointed.  Exactly  a  mile  be- 
yond the  city,  on  the  Plymouth  road,  there  are  two 
white  cottages  ;  one  is  theirs,  and  the  other  belongs  to 
their  landlady.  I  almost  forget  the  number  of  rooms, 
but  there  is  an  excellent  parlor  with  two  other  rooms 
on  the  ground  floor  ;  there  is  really  a  beautiful  little 
room  over  the  parlor  which  I  am  furnishing  as  a  draw- 
ing-room, and  there  is  a  splendid  garden.  The  j)aint 
and  paper  throughout  is  new  and  fresh  and  cheerful- 
looking  ;  the  place  is  clean  beyond  all  descri]3tion  ;  and 
the  neighborhood  I  supjoose  the  most  beautiful  in  this 
most  beautiful  of  English  counties.  Of  the  landlady, 
a  Devonshire  widow,  with  whom  I  had  the  honor  of 
taking  lunch  to-day,  I  must  make  most  esjiecial  men- 
tion. She  is  a  fat,  infirm,  splendidly  fresh-faced  coun- 
try dame,  rising  sixty,  and  recovering  from  an  attack 
on  the  nerves.  I  thought  they  never  went  of:  the 
stones,  but  I  find  they  try  country  air  with  the  best  of 
us.  In  the  event  of  my  mother's  being  ill  at  any  time, 
I  really  think  the  vicinity  of  this  good  dame,  the  very 
lecture  of  respectability  and  good  humor,  will  be  the 
greatest  possible  comfort.  ...  I  am  sure  they  may 
be  hajDpy  there  ;  for  if  I  were  older,  and  my  course  of 
activity  were  run,  I  am  sure  I  could,  with  God's  bless- 
ing, for  many  and  many  a  year." 

Charles  Dickens'  s  mother  died  in  September,  1868. 
We  find  no  further  mention  of  her,  except  the  mere 
fact  of  her  death,  in  Forster's  "  Life  of  Dickens,"  after 
he  had  provided  his  parents  with  the  comfortable 
Devonshire  cottage. 

His  father  died  on  the  31st  of  March,  1851.     Both 


140  CHARLES   DICKENS'S  MOTHER. 

while  he  lived  and  after  his  death  Dickens  invariably 
spoke  of  him  in  terms  of  respect  as  well  as  affection. 
To  his  mother  rather  than  to  John  Dickens  he  attributed, 
as  we  have  seen,  the  hardness  of  his  early  lot.  It  w^ould 
be  unjust  to  suppose,  however,  that  because  he  men- 
tioned her  so  seldom  and  then  chiefly  as  associated  with 
such  bitter  recollections,  he  bore  her  any  ill-will.  It  is 
to  be  regretted,  nevertheless,  that  there  is  so  little  evi- 
dence of  that  life-long  affection  for  his  mother  which 
one  looks  for  in  a  generous  son.  It  may  be  that  she 
failed  to  discern  his  genius  or  sympathize  with  his 
early  aspirations,  which  certainly  wete  of  a  noble  kind. 
The  impression  she  leaves  upon  the  mind  is  that  of 
weakness  and  want  of  insight  and  forecast.  But  in 
estimating  her  character,  allowance  must  be  made  for 
the  peculiar  trials  she  was  called  upon  to  undergo.  It 
is  difficult  for  this  very  reason  to  share  Dickens's  ad- 
miration of  his  father.  With  a  government  situation, 
which  in  England  is  permanent,  and  which  gave  him  a 
regular  salary,  there  is  little  excuse  for  him,  as  a  hus- 
band and  father,  in  involving  his  family  in  disgrace  and 
discomfort  through  extravagance  or  mismanagement. 
He  seems  to  have  been  one  of  those  who  "  had  rather 
teach  twenty  what  were  right  to  be  done  than  to  be 
one  of  the  twenty  to  follow  his  own  teaching."  Vain 
of  his  own  importance,  full  of  admu'ation  for  his  own 
sententious  wisdom,  and  pity  for  his  own  privations, 
there  seems  to  have  been  as  little  steady  principle  about 
money  matters  in  him  as  in  Leigh  Hunt,  the  supposed 
original  of  Harold  Skimj)ole,  w^ho  only  asks  to  be  per- 
mitted to  live  and  enjoy  life — at  other  people's  ex- 
pense. 


TRYING   CIRCUMSTANCES.  141 

His  wife,  on  the  other  hand,  had  to  keep  house  for  a 
large  family  without  the  necessary  funds  to  meet  their 
every-day  expenses.  If  she  could  not  pay  the  butcher 
and  baker,  it  was  certainly  not  her  fault,  but  that  of  her 
husband,  who  was  too  generous  to  himself  and  spent 
upon  his  own  comforts,  like  Turveydrop  Senior,  the 
money  that  should  have  been  held  sacred  to  household 
exj)enditure.  It  was  natural  for  Mrs.  Dickens,  who 
certainly  was  not  a  woman  of  genius,  to  wish  her  boys 
to  be  self-supporting  as  early  as  possible.  Hence  what 
seemed  to  Dickens  the  cruelty  of  keeping  him  for  two 
years  at  the  detestable  blacking  business.  As  it  proved 
in  the  long  run,  his  mother  was  really  laying  the  foun- 
dations of  his  fortune  and  fame,  for  had  it  not  been  for 
those  early  ex2:)eriences  he  would  never  have  studied  and 
grasped  all  conditions  of  life  and  character  as  he  did. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  "  the  iron  entered  into  his  soul 
and  made  long  furrows,"  and  that  for  years,  and  in- 
deed until  the  Hungerford  Bridge,  close  to  which  it 
stood,  was  pulled  down,  Dickens  could  never  pass  the 
scene  of  his  early  humiliations.  But  as  in  the  case  of 
his  wife,  so  with  that  of  his  mother,  the  question  may 
he  asked  whether  he  made  sufficient  allowance  for  the 
weakness  and  defencelessness  of  women,  especially  of 
a  woman  placed  in  such  trying  circumstances  as  his 
mother  was.  Yet  w^e  would  fain  hope  and  believe  that 
his  heart  was  right  toward  her,  although  he  could 
' '  never  forget' '  that  it  was  his  mother  who  advocated 
his  continuance  at  a  drudgery  which  was  naturally 
repugnant  to  his  nature. 

Mrs.  John  Dickens  was  not  the  only  mother  who  has 
failed  to  discern  her  children's  intellectual  gifts.     The 


142  CHARLES   DICKENS'S  MOTHER. 

story  of  Charles  Dickens's  childliood  is  a  lesson  to 
mothers  in  this  respect.  A  mother  should  not  only- 
have  no  favorites  among  her  children,  but  she  should 
be  the  earliest  confidante  of  all  their  thoughts  and 
hopes.  Too  often  the  last  person  to  whom  the  sensitive 
child  is  willing  to  open  his  griefs,  reveal  his  inner  self, 
and  show  the  little  efforts  of  his  boyish  ambition,  is  his 
mother.  How  many  mothers  entertain  in  the  neglected 
and  discouraged  child  "an  angel  unawares."  They 
praise  the  boy  who  is  full  of  physical  courage  and 
energy,  and  even  the  scrapes  he  gets  into  makes  him 
dearer  to  the  mother.  But  the  solemn,  solitary, 
thoughtful  child,  who  builds  castles  in  the  air  and  sees 
Aladdin's  palace  in  the  red  coals  of  the  nursery  fire,  is 
too  often  looked  upon  by  his  mother  as  an  odd  boy 
who  will  never  be  good  for  much.  Nothing  connected 
with  humanity  is  more  touching  than  the  child's 
yearning  for  sympathy  and  keen  sense  of  isolation 
and  neglect.  A  cold,  worldly  mother  repels  "  the 
young  lamb's  heart."  The  neglected  boy  or  girl  hide 
their  loneliness  and  bury  their  wealth  of  love  and 
brightness  in  their  own  throbbing  hearts.  Sometimes 
the  father  has  looks  and  ways  of  sympathy  and  ten- 
derness toward  them  which  the  mother  never  feels,  or 
feeling,  never  shows.  When  the  family,  like  the  elder 
Dickens's  household,  is  in  straitened  circumstances, 
the  mother  is  apt  to  be  especially  impatient  with  the 
first  symptoms  of  anything  like  a  romantic  and  un- 
practical turn  of  mind.  Her  thoughts  are  of  daily 
bread,  and  how  soon  her  boys  can  earn  it.  Charles 
Dickens  felt  his  own  neglect  the  more  keenly,  no 
doubt,  because  the  talent  of  his  elder  sister,   Fanny, 


A   HOUSEHOLD   DRUDGE.  143 

was  at  once  recognized  and  made  the  most  of  by  the 
mother.  When  he  was  the  poor  blacking  boy  at  six 
shillings  a  week,  his  sister  w^as  a  pupil  at  the  Royal 
Academy  of  Music,  and  he  used  to  call  for  her  early 
every  Sunday  morning,  so  that  they  might  spend  the 
day  with  their  i)arents  in  the  Marshalsea  and  see  her 
safe  home  at  night.  Poor  boy  !  he  must  have  felt  sad 
indeed  as  he  ate  the  crust  ^f  bread  and  slice  of  cheese 
he  used  to  put. by  for  his  supper  and  went  to  his  ill- 
furnished  bedroom,  to  think  of  the  week  of  menial 
drudgery  that  lay  before  him,  and  w^hich  then  seemed 
likely  to  go  on  without  alleviation  for  years,  if  not  for 
life.  Early  feelings  and  experiences  are  the  most  en- 
during with  all  of  us,  and  in  i)roportion  to  the  child's 
sensitiveness  will  be  the  depth  of  the  scars  which  the 
sorrows  of  childhood  leave  behind  them.  Too  many 
parents,  alas,  imagine  that  so  long  as  the  child  is  fed 
and  clad  all  is  going  w^ell  with  it. 

On  the  other  hand,  mothers  must  be  judged  of,  not 
by  an  ideal  and  sentimental  standard,  but  by  their  ac- 
tual surroundings  and  opjiortunities.  The  mother  of 
Charles  Dickens,  with  so  many  children  and  so  un- 
thrifty a  husband,  could  have  little  time  and  impulse 
for  the  higher  and  more  prospective  feelings.  She  can 
have  been  little  better  than  a  household  drudge,  always 
troubled  with  sordid  cares  and  immediate  difficulties. 
A  good  mother  is  a  term  of  wide  and  various  applica- 
tion. She  who  sews  and  mends  and  gets  the  meals  and 
teaches  the  alphabet  to  her  children  is  a  good  mother. 
She  who,  dreading  a  fresh  creditor's  demand  with 
every  knock  and  ring,  and  who  has  at  last  to  carry  her 
brood  with  her  to  join  her  husband  in  a  debtors'  prison. 


144  •        CHARLES   DICKENS'S   MOTHER. 

after  every  houseliold  treasure  has  been  carried  to  a 
pawnbroker's,  is  a  good  mother,  even  if  not  always  a 
wise  one,  in  wishing  her  little  ones  to  learn  a  trade  and 
earn  their  daily  bread  when  more  favored  children  are 
storing  their  minds  with  mental  capital  at  school.  No 
doubt  this  mother  rejoiced  in  her  heart  of  hearts,  as 
only  a  mother  can,  when  she  saw  her  poor  boy  trans- 
formed into  the  wealthy  man  by  the  exercise  and 
market  value  of  such  intellectual  gifts  as  very  few 
I)ossess,  and  of  which,  amid  her  daily  drudgery,  she 
could  have  formed  no  previous  estimate.  The  com- 
monplace mother  of  a  man  of  genius  gets  little  credit, 
but  there  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  the  mother  of 
Charles  Dickens,  whose  cares  and  burdens  were  so 
heavy,  did  her  duty  to  him  with  all  true  motherly 
affection,  according  to  her  lights.  Had  she  been  differ- 
ently situated  there  is  no  doubt  but  that  she  would 
have  educated  her  little  boy,  and  shared  with  him  her 
every  blessing.  Poverty  is  a  bitter  foe,  and  to  a  mother 
of  many  children  it  is  cruel  and  terrible.  It  dries  up 
the  affections,  closes  up  the  avenues  of  hope  and  mirth, 
and  keeps  its  victims  morose,  harassed,  and  anxious 
in  spirit.  It  is  cruel  fate  to  be  a  mother  under  such 
circumstances,  and  sad  indeed  is  it  to  be  unloved  and 
ignored  by  one's  children  in  after  years  because  of  such 
misfortunes.  It  has  always  seemed  to  us  to  detract 
from  Dickens's  character  that  he  has  left  nowhere  any 
affectionate  reference  to  his  mother.  He  seemed  never 
to  realize,  or  to  be  willing  to  admit,  tliat  the  "  iron 
which  entered  his  soul"  had  reached  him  only  after  it 
had  passed  through  hers.  It  was  his  misfortune,  not 
her  fault,  that  he  failed  to  judge  her  unselfishly,  and 


AN    UNFORTUNATE   POSITION.  145 

to  make  allowance  for  her  lieli)less  and  defenceless  po- 
sition in  life  as  the  wife  of  her  husband  and  the  mother 
of  his  many  children,  whom  she  loved  but  could  not 
properly  rear,  however  much  she  desired  to  do  so. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  JOHN  WESLEY. 

The  character  of  Jolin  Wesley,  the  founder  of 
Methodism,  presents  one  of  the  finest  studies  in  modern 
biography.  Dr.  Johnson,  who  was  not  easily  satisfied, 
was  pleased  with  the  conversation  of  John  Wesley,  and 
objected  to  him  only  that  he  seemed  to  begrudge  every 
half  hour  of  relaxation  as  so  much  stolen  from  the  dis- 
charge of  active  business.  Whoever  reads  the  life  of 
Wesley,  which  has  been  written  by  Southey,  and  more 
in  detail  by  later  biographers,  must  be  struck  with  this 
characteristic,  that  he  never  was  idle.  From  sunrise 
until  midnight  his  energies  sufficed  for  constant  and 
laborious  work.  He  was  to  evangelical  religion  what 
Francis  Xavier  and  other  never-tiring  missionaries  have 
been  to  the  Roman  Catholic  Church.  He  had  within 
him  the  materials  of  faith  and  energy  of  which 
the  greatest  saints  and  martyrs  have  been  formed, 
and  beside  him  the  mere  eloquent  pulpiteer  and 
worldly  clergyman  of  the  Established  Church  of  Eng- 
land of  his  time  becomes  wholly  contemptible.  If 
we  want  proof  of  the  extraordinary  character  of  the 
man,  we  have  but  to  look  at  the  largest  religious 
denomination  in  America,  and  one  of  the  most  \^^de- 
spreading  and  inlluential  in  all  lands,  the  Methodist 
Church.  It  is  too  large  to  be  ignored,  for  it  has  a 
membership  of  millions  ;  it  is  too  tremendous  in  its 
influence  upon  society  to  be  laughed  at,  even  by  those 


SOME   LEADING   CHARACTERISTICS.  147 

wlio  have  least  sympathy  with  its  more  sensational 
methods  of  camp-meetings  and  revivals.  John  Wesley 
would  not  have  encouraged  the  emotional  excesses 
of  some  of  his  followers.  His  mind  was  of  too  high  an 
order  to  stoop  to  childish  demonstrations,  but  he  be- 
lieved heart  and  soul  in  devotion  to  Christ  and  renun- 
ciation of  the  world,  and  his  favorite  work,  of  which  he 
translated  all  but  the  part  which  maintains  the  Roman 
\dew  of  the  Eucharist,  was  the  beautiful  "  Imitation  of 
Christ,"  by  Thomas  a  Kempis. 

Work  and  prayer,  the  one  constant,  the  other  instant, 
are  the  key-notes  of  John  Wesley's  life,  and  when  we  in- 
quire for  the  source  from  which  he  derived  these  guid- 
ing principles  of  his  life,  investigation  answers  clearly, 
From  his  mother.  The  letters  of  Weslev's  mother  are 
the  counterpart  of  Wesley's  life.  Always  working, 
always  leaning  on  the  everlasting  arms  of  God,  always 
regulating  the  minutest  duties  of  life  with  punctuality 
and  performing  them  with  clock-like  steadfastness  and 
patience,  restraining  the  imagination  by  the  reins  of 
duty,  imparting  to  others  the  precepts  and  counsels 
which  she  put  in  practice  herself,  the  mother  of  John 
Wesley  was  virtually  the  mother  of  the  Israel  he 
founded.  There  are  very  few  religious  writers,  very 
few  Fathers  of  the  Early  Church  or  bishops  of  the  mod- 
ern, who  excel  Wesley's  mother  in  clearness,  force, 
and  intelligence  on  the  subject  of  religion  and  moral 
conduct. 

]N"ot  only  had  Susannah  Wesley  a  devout  and 
rational  theological  instinct,  but  her  mind  had  been 
carefully  trained  in  secular  knowledge,  and  she  had  by 
self-culture  attained   unusual   accomplishments.     The 


148  THE   MOTHER   OF   JOHN   WESLEY. 

reasoning  powers  which  were  so  early  developed  in 
John  Wesley  were  conspicuous  in  his  mother.  Adam 
Clarke  says  of  her  :  "  Mrs.  Wesley  had  read  much  and 
thought  much,  and  thus  her  mind  was  cultivated. 
Greek,  Latin,  and  French,  and  both  logic  and  meta- 
physics had  formed  part  of  her  studies  ;  and  these 
latter  acquisitions,  without  appearing— for  she  studi- 
ously endeavors  to  conceal  them — are  felt  to  great  ad- 
vantage in  all  her  writings.  She  had  a  strong  and 
vigorous  mind,  and  an  undaunted  courage.  She  feared 
no  difficulty,  and  in  search  of  truth  at  once  looked  the 
most  formidable  objections  fall  in  the  face  ;  and  never 
hesitated  to  give  any  enemy  all  the  vantage  ground  he 
could  gain,  when  she  rose  up  to  defend  either  the  doc- 
trines or  precepts  of  the  religion  of  the  Bible."  He 
bears  witness  also  to  the  beauty  of  her  person,  jDro- 
nouncing  her  not  only  graceful  but  beautiful,  and  add- 
ing that  her  sister  Judith,  painted  by  Sir  Peter  Lely,  is 
represented  as  a  very  beautiful  woman,  but  one  who 
w^ell  knew  both  said,  "  Beautiful  as  Miss  Annesley  aj)- 
pears,  she  was  far  from  being  as  beautiful  as  Mrs. 
Wesley." 

John  Wesley's  father,  Samuel  Westley,  as  he  al- 
ways spelled  it,  and  his  mother  Susannah  Annesley, 
were  both  the  children  of  Nonconformist  ministers, 
that  is,  of  beneficed  preachers  who  were  ejected  from 
their  livings  because  they  had  not  received  Episcopal 
ordination.  His  grandfather,  John  Wesley,  was  ac- 
counted one  of  the  martyrs  of  nonconformity,  but  his 
son,  who  was  but  eight  years  old  when  his  father  died, 
became  disgusted  with  the  more  bigoted  of  these  Dis- 
senters who  defended  the  execution  of  King  Charles  the 


HER   VIEWS   EXPLAINED.  l-iS 

First,  which  they  celebrated  with  atrociously  bad  taste 
by  a  Calf  s  Head  Club.  When  little  more  than  a  child 
Samuel  Wesley  left  them,  and  instead  of  ^oing  to  their 
academy  and  i^reparing  for  their  ministry  he  made  his 
way  to  Exeter  College,  Oxford,  took  orders  in  the  Es- 
tablished Church,  and  writing  a  defence  of  the  revolu- 
tion, which  he  dedicated  to  Queen  Mary,  daughter  of 
James  the  Second  and  wife  of  William  the  Third,  he 
received  from  her  the  living  of  Epworth. 

Susannah,  his  future  wife,  was  the  daughter  of  the 
Rev.  Dr.  Annesley,  who,  like  Wesley's  grandfather, 
was  ejected  from  his  living.  She,  too,  abandoned  the 
Dissenters  and  became  a  stanch  adherent  of  the  State 
Church.  A  letter  to  her  eldest  son,  Samuel,  the  elder 
brother  of  John  and  Charles,  so  fully  explains  her 
motives  that  it  is  well  to  quote  it  as  throwing  light 
upon  her  conscientious  and  independent  character.  It 
is  dated  October  11th,  1709,  and  reads  :  "  There  is 
nothing  I  now  desire  to  live  for,  but  to  do  some  small 
service  to  my  children  ;  that,  as  I  have  brought  them 
into  the  world,  I  may,  if  it  please  God,  be  an  instru- 
ment of  doing  good  to  their  souls.  I  have  been  several 
years  collecting  from  my  little  reading,  but  chiefly  from 
my  own  observation  and  experience,  some  things 
Avliich  I  hoped  might  be  useful  to  you  all.  I  had  begun 
to  correct  and  form  all  into  a  little  manual,  wherein 
I  designed  you  should  have  seen  what  were  the  par- 
ticular reasons  which  prevailed  on  me  to  believe  the 
being  of  a  God,  and  the  ground  for  natural  religion, 
together  with  the  motives  that  induced  me  to  embrace 
the  faith  of  Jesus  Christ ;  under  which  was  compre- 
hended my  own  private  reasons  for  the  truth  of  re- 


150  THE   MOTHER   OF   JOHN    WESLEY. 

vealed  religion  ;  and  because  I  was  educated  among  the 
Dissenters,  and  there  was  something  remarkable  in  my 
leaving  them  at  so  early  an  age,  not  being  full  thirteen, 
I  had  drawn  up  an  account  of  the  whole  transaction, 
under  which  I  had  included  the  main  of  the  contro- 
versy between  them  and  the  Established  Church,  so  far 
as  it  had  come  to  my  knowledge,  and  then  followed  the 
reasons  which  had  determined  my  judgment  to  the 
preference  of  the  Church  of  England,  I  had  fairly 
transcribed  a  great  part  of  it,  but  before  I  could  finish 
my  design,  the  flames  consumed  both  this  and  all  my 
other  writings/' 

The  same  independent  spirit  which  made  Susannah 
Annesley,  when  a  girl,  leave  the  Dissenters  for  the 
Church  of  England,  was  exhibited  in  two  notable 
differences,  the  one  political,  the  other  religious,  which 
she  had  with  her  husband.  They  serve  equally  with 
the  above  letter  to  bring  her  remarkable  characteristics, 
which  her  great  son  inherited  from  her,  into  strong  re- 
lief. While  the  Rector  of  Ep worth,  as  we  have  seen, 
had  written  in  defence  of  King  William,  his  wife  was 
silently  a  Jacobite  in  her  political  opinions.  She  dis- 
approved of  the  Revolution,  and  it  was  about  a  year 
before  William  of  Orange  died  that  her  husband  first 
remarked  that  when  he  craved  for  him  as  King  she  did 
not  say  amen.  When  he  questioned  her,  she  told  him 
frankly  that  she  did  not  regard  Prince  William  of 
Orange  as  King  of  England  lawfully  and  by  divine 
right.  This  so  inflamed  her  husband  that  he  vowed 
never  to  live  with  her  again  wliile  she  held  that  opinion, 
and  mounting  liis  horse  he  rode  away  in  anger  from  the 
parsonage.     She  did  not  hear  from  him  again  until  a 


MRS.    WESLEY'S   PRAYER-MEETINGS.  151 

year  afterward,  when  the  death  of  King  William  re- 
leased him  from  his  rash  vow.  Of  the  nineteen  chil- 
dren that  were  born  to  them,  John,  or  John  Benjamin, 
as  the  founder  of  Methodism  was  christened,  was  the 
first  who  came  after  this  reconciliation,  and  was  their 
second  son. 

The  other  instance  of  Mrs.  Wesley's  independence  is 
the  more  interesting  because  it  places  her  before  us 
almost  as  the  forerunner  of  Methodism,  and  as  uncon- 
sciously anticipating  the  irregular  methods  by  which 
the  most  regular  of  men  was  subsequently  to  revolu- 
tionize Protestant  Christendom. 

Mr.  Wesley,  as  a  beneficed  clergyman,  used  to  attend 
the  Convocations  of  the  clergy  in  London,  and  while 
he  was  absent  from  his  Lincolnshire  parish  his  wife 
used  to  pray  with  her  own  family  on  Sunday  evenings 
when  there  was  no  service  at  the  church.  After 
prayers  she  read  a  sermon  to  them,  and  then  engaged 
in  religious  conversation.  Sometimes  one  or  more  of 
the  parishioners  w^ould  happen  to  drop  in  at  the  time, 
l)ut  she  did  not  allow  their  presence  to  disturb  the 
fnmily  service.  They  were  so  much  impressed  by  her 
discourse  and  the  solemnity  of  the  scene  that  they 
would  repeat  their  visits,  and  bring  others  with  them. 
At  length  some  forty  of  the  villagers  w^ere  regular  at- 
tendants. She  chose  "  the  best  and  most  aw^akening 
sermons,"  and  a  revival  of  religion  w^as  perceptible  at 
Epworth.  This  enraged  one  of  the  curates,  a  vain, 
sensual  fellow,  who  dreaded  the  growth  of  a  strictness 
which  w^ould  rebuke  his  own  careless  living,  and  he 
wrote  to  Mr.  Wesley  that  a  "  conventicle  was  being 
held  at  the  parsonage."     The  mere  word  was  enough 


152  THE  MOTHER   OF  JOHN   WESLEY. 

to  carry  terror  with  it  in  those  days,  when  irregular 
religious  assemhlies  were  punishable  as  breaches  of  the 
law.  He  wrote  at  once  to  his  wife,  objecting  to  her 
meetings  because  of  her  sex,  and  because  "  it  looked 
particular  ;"  and  reminded  her  that  his  own  position  as 
rector  would  be  compromised.  She  thanks  him  for 
speaking  candidly,  and  answers,  "  As  to  its  looking 
particular,  I  grant  it  does  ;  and  so  does  almost  every- 
thing that  is  serious,  or  that  may  any  way  advance  the 
glory  of  God  or  the  salvation  of  souls,  if  it  be  per- 
formed out  of  a  i)uli)it  or  in  the  way  of  common  con- 
versation ;  because  in  our  corrupt  age  the  utmost  care 
and  diligence  has  been  used  to  banish  all  discourse  of 
God,  or  spiiitual  concerns,  out  of  society,  as  if  re- 
ligion were  never  to  appear  out  of  the  closet,  and  we 
were  to  be  ashamed  of  nothing  so  much  as  of  confess- 
ing ourselves  to  be  Christians.'"  Although  the  age  of 
women's  rights  had  not  yet  come,  Mrs.  Wesley  did  not 
hesitate  to  claim  that  in  the  absence  of  her  husband  it 
was  not  only  her  duty  to  attend  to  the  religion  of  their 
children,  but  to  take  care  of  the  souls  of  his  parish- 
ioners. "  If  lam  unfaithful,"  she  says,  "  to  Him  or  to 
you,  in  neglecting  to  improve  these  talents,  how  shall  I 
answer  unto  Him  when  He  shall  command  me  to  render 
an  account  of  my  stewardship?''  As  for  what  evil 
tongues  might  say  of  her,  she  added,  "  For  my  own 
part,  I  value  no  censure  on  this  account ;  I  have  long 
since  shook  hands  with  the  world,  and  I  heartilv  wish 
I  had  never  given  them  more  reason  to  speak  against 
me."  Her  enemies  were  hard  at  work,  however,  and 
the  absent  rector  was  not  quieted  in  his  apprehensions 
by   her   letters.     He   wrote    again    more   stringently. 


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O 

HER   UNANSWERED   LETTER.  155 

After  taking  some  days  to  think  it  over,  Mrs.  Wesley- 
replied  again  that  she  was  surj^rised  that  he  should  be 
frightened  by  the  silly  clamor  of  a  few  of  the  worst 
men  in  the  parish  ;  that  her  meetings  had  induced 
many  to  be  regular  at  church  and  to  reform  their  way 
of  living,  and  that  the  curate  who  i^retended  to  be  so 
scandalized  would  himself  suffer  from  their  discontinu- 
ance, since  those  who  had  derived  benefit  from  them 
would  know  that  they  were  discontinued  through  his 
interference.  Finally,  she  thus  referred  to  her  own 
duty  as  a  wife  who  had  promised  to  "  obey."  "  If  you 
do,  after  all,  think  fit  to  dissolve  this  assembly,  do  not 
tell  me  that 'you  desire  me  to  do  it,  for  that  will  not 
satisfy  my  conscience  ;  but  send  me  jour  positive  com- 
mand, in  such  full  and  express  terms  as  may  absolve 
me  from  guilt  and  punishment  for  neglecting  this  op- 
portunity of  doing  good,  when  you  and  I  shall  appear 
before  the  Great  and  awful  Tribunal  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ."  One  would  almost  imagine  we  were  reading 
some  reply  of  her  son,  John  Wesley,  to  the  punctilious 
reprimand  of  a  bishop.  Her  husband  said  no  more, 
feeling,  no  doubt,  that  he  had  the  worst  of  the  argu- 
ment. 

To  form  a  complete  estimate  of  Susannah  Wesley,  as 
of  any  other  mother,  we  must  consider  her  method  with 
her  children.  Within  a  few  years  it  is  two  hundred 
years  ago  since  she  became  the  wife  of  John  Wes- 
ley's father.  They  were  married  in  1689,  when  she 
was  nineteen  years  of  age.  She  bore  him  nineteen 
children,  of  whom  thirteen  lived  to  be  educated  by 
her,  and  ten  reached  maturity.  Only  three  sons 
grew  up  to   manhood,  of  whom  Samuel,  the  eldest, 


156  THE   MOTHER   OF   JOHN    WESLEY. 

was  thirteen  years  old  when  John  was  born.  He 
became  distinguished  as  a  scholar,  was  sent  to  West- 
minster School  and  to  Oxford,  and  acquired  the 
friendship  of  Lord  Oxford,  the  Mecsenas  of  his  age, 
as  well  as  of  Addison,  Pope,  Prior,  and  Bishop 
Atterbury.  He  became  Head  Master  of  Tiverton 
School,  but  his  political  opinions  kept  him  from 
government  preferment.  Emilia,  the  next  child,  was 
a  year  younger  than  Samuel,  and  was  remarkable,  like 
her  mother,  for  beauty  and  intelligence.  Susannah, 
two  years  her  junior,  came  next.  Then  Mary,  a  year 
younger,  who  was  deformed  through  the  carelessness 
of  her  nurse.  She  seemed  to  have  been  her  father's 
favorite.  Mehetabel,  but  one  year  younger  than  Mary, 
was  six  at  John  Wesley's  buth.  She  was  the  most 
precocious  in  intellect,  and  at  eight  could  read  the  New 
Testament  in  Greek.  Others  had  died,  among  them  a 
John  and  a  Benjamin,  whose  names  were  blended  in 
John's  baptismal  name.  Anne  was  still  an  infant  at 
his  coming,  and  Martha,  Charles,  and  Keziah  came  after 
him. 

Mrs.  Wesley  educated  these  children  herself,  John 
included,  until  he  went  to  the  Charterhouse.  He  him- 
self has  recorded  that  besides  the  care  of  thirteen  living 
children,  his  mother  transacted  business,  wrote  letters, 
and  enjoyed  social  conversation.  She  managed  the 
secular  affairs  of  the  rectory,  for  her  husband  was  a 
bad  financier,  and  before  John  was  three  years  old  was 
cast  into  prison  for  debt.  The  tithes  and  glebe  were 
henceforth  managed  by  her.  Had  this  remarkable 
woman,  whose  burdens  of  maternity  would  have  ex- 
hausted or  killed  any  ordinary  constitution,  not  thor- 


THE  BEARING  OF  CHILDREN.  157 

oughly  understood  the  science  of  method  and  the 
economy  of  time,  she  could  not  have  ruled  her  house- 
hold as  she  did.  She  had  a  time  and  place  for  every- 
thing, and  allowed  no  jostling  or  confusion  in  the 
orderly  sequence  of  her  daily  administration. 

In  those  days  childi^en  were  brought  up  far  more 
strictly  than  in  our  own.  In  America  to-day  there  is 
far  too  much  laxity  and  so-called  freedom  allowed  to 
children.  Hence  the  difficulty  which  x>arents  find  in 
restraining  their  children  when  self  Mill  has  become  a 
habit  and  the  animal  passions  assert  themselves.  Mrs. 
Wesley,  on  the  other  hand,  was  strict  even  to  severity, 
and  was  too  legal  and  prohibitive  a  mother.  There  is 
a  middle  course  which  leaves  the  children  free,  because 
it  teaches  them  to  find  freedom  in  law  and  in  obedience. 
The  human  being  who  starts  with  the  resolve  that  his 
or  her  will  shall  be  done  on  earth  is  sure  to  come  to 
grief.  But  the  wings  that  are  clipped  and  never  learn 
to  soar  in  youth  are  apt  to  retain  this  unnatural  con- 
straint through  life.  It  is  a  wonder  that  Mrs.  Wesley, 
who  knew^  so  well  the  Gospel  which  tells  of  ' '  the  per- 
fect law  of  liberty,"  did  not  allow  nature  a  more  spon- 
taneous share  in  the  mental  and  moral  growth  of  her 
little  ones.  But  her  opinions  on  this  subject  were  set 
and  insuperable,  and  it  is  better  for  the  child  to  be 
severely  trained  than  left  to  grow  up  without  the  sense 
of  law  and  duty.  Mrs.  Wesley's  great  prescrij)tion 
was  to  break  the  wills  of  her  children,  forgetting  that 
with  many  children  the  will  is  good  and  docile  from  the 
first,  and  that  to  break  it  is  to  mar  God' s  work.  But, 
writing  on  the  will,  she  says  :  "  As  self-will  is  the  root 
of  all  sin  and  misery,  so  whatever  cherishes  this  in 


158  THE   MOTHER   OF   JOHN    WESLEY. 

children  insures  their  after  wretchedness  and  irre- 
ligion  ;  whatever  checks  and  mortifies  it  i)romotes  their 
future  happiness  and  piety.  This  is  still  more  evident 
if  we  consider  that  religion  is  nothing  else  than  the 
doing  the  will  of  God,  and  not  our  own  ;  that  the  one 
grand  imjoediment  to  our  temporal  and  eternal  happi- 
ness being  this  self-will,  no  indulgence  of  it  can  be 
trivial,  no  denial  unprofitable.  Heaven  or  hell  depends 
on  this,  so  that  the  parent  who  studies  to  subdue  it  in 
his  child  works  together  with  Grod  in  the  rene\\dng  and 
saving  a  soul.  The  parent  who  indulges  does  the 
devil's  work — makes  religion  imxDracticable,  salvation 
unattainable."  All  this  is  more  consonant  with,  the 
severer  Calvinistic  philosoi)hy  which  John  Wesley 
so  strongly  opposed  Avlien  it  was  urged  by  White- 
field,  than  with  the  view  taken  by  the  Saviour  of 
those  little  ones  whose  angels,  He  said,  "do  always 
behold"  the  face  of  their  Heavenly  Father,  and 
whom  He  deemed  the  nearest  likenesses  to  the  in- 
habitants of  heaven.  It  is  appropriate  to  note  here 
that  her  system  was  successful,  and  made  John  Wesley 
an  absolute  ruler  in  the  church  he  founded,  beside  ren- 
dering him  so  punctilious  in  details  and  precise  in  the 
use  of  time,  that  Dr.  Johnson,  the  greatest  Christian 
moralist  of  his  age,  thought  it  detracted  from  the  ami- 
ability of  his  character. 

There  is  no  disputing,  however,  the  truth  of  Mrs. 
Wesley's  further  observations  :  "In  the  esteem  of  the 
world,  they  pass  for  kind  and  indulgent  whom  I  call 
cruel  parents  ;  who  permit  their  children  to  get  habits 
which  they  know  must  be  afterward  broken.  Nay, 
some  are  so  stupidly  fond  as  in  sport  to  teach  their  chil- 


THE   WESLEY   CHILDREN.  159 

dren  to  do  tilings  which  in  a  while  after  they  severely 
beat  them  for  doing.  When  the  will  of  a  child  is 
totally  subdued,  and  it  is  brought  to  revere  and  stand 
in  awe  of  its  parents,  then  a  great  many  childish  follies 
and  inadvertencies  may  be  passed  by."  The  rules 
which  Mrs.  Wesley  laid  down  for  the  government  of 
her  children  may  be  thus  summarized :  When  the 
child  was  a  year  old,  it  was  taught  to  fear  the  rod,  and 
to  cry  softly,  if  it  cried  at  all.  Wesley,  in  a  sermon  on 
the  education  of  children,  commends  his  mother's  dis- 
cipline in  this  particular,  and  urges  parents  never  to 
give  a  child  the  thing  it  cries  for,  because  to  do  so  is  to 
reward  it  for  crying  and  to  encourage  it  to  cry  habitu- 
ally for  whatever  it  desires. 

The  Wesley  children  were  allowed  three  meals  a  day, 
but  the  troublesome  habit  of  eating  and  drinking  be- 
tween meals  was  jDositively  forbidden  them.  They 
were  washed  and  put  to  bed  at  eight  o'  clock,  the  eldei 
children  attending  to  the  younger  ones.  The  whole 
family  were  taught  the  Lord' s  Prayer  as  soon  as  they 
could  speak,  and  had  to  repeat  it  night  and  morning 
at  their  mother' s  knee.  Rudeness  to  each  other  was 
never  tolerated  by  her.  Six  hours  a  day  were  sj^ent  in 
study.  Loud  talMng  and  playing  in  the  street  or 
garden  without  jiermission  were  forbidden.  With  the 
exception  of  Keziah,  the  Wesleys  were  not  taught  to 
read  until  they  were  five  years  old,  and  then  only  one 
day  was  allowed  them  for  learning  the  alphabet,  a 
task  which  all  accomplished  except  Mary  and  Anne, 
who  took  a  day  and  a  half  to  learn  their  letters  per- 
fectly. They  were  taught  to  sing  hymns  every  morn- 
ing when  school  was  opened,  and  at  the  close  of  each 


160  THE   MOTHER  OF   JOHN   WESLEY. 

day's  work.  Tlie  elder  children  read  the  Psalms  for 
the  day  out  of  the  Prayer-book,  and  a  chai^ter  of  the 
Bible  to  the  younger  ones.  Such  was  the  discipline 
John  Wesley  was  bred  up  in,  until  at  ten  years  of  age 
he  was  sent  to  London  and  became  a  scholar  of  the 
Charterhouse,  where  he  was  admitted  on  January  28th, 
1713-14.  At  the  age  of  sixteen  he  left  school,  and  at 
seventeen  entered  Christ  Church,  Oxford.  "  Terrible," 
says  the  Rev.  L.  Tyerman,  one  of  his  biographers,  "  is 
t]ie  danger  when  a  child  leaves  a  pious  home  for  a 
public  school.  John  Wesley  entered  the  Charterhouse 
a  saint,  and  left  it  a  sinner." 

The  Rectory  at  Ej) worth  had  caught  fire  when  John 
was  about  six  years  old.  His  mother  "  waded  through 
the  fire,"  as  she  says,  but  John,  who  was  missing  when 
his  father  took  count  of  the  children,  seems  to  have 
been  rescued  by  a  man  who  saw  him  at  an  upper  win- 
dow, and  reached  him  by  climbing  up  another's 
shoulders.  This  was  not  the  only  alarming  visitation 
which  came  upon  the  rector  and  his  family.  While 
John  was  at  the  Charterhouse,  his  mother  and  sisters 
acquaint  him  with  a  series  of  extraordinary  and  unac- 
countable disturbances,  resembling  precisely  some  of 
the  phenomena  of  modern  Spiritualism.  Toward  the 
close  of  the  year  1715,  the  maid-servant  was  terrified 
by  hearing  at  the  dining-room  door  several  dismal 
groans,  as  of  a  person  at  the  point  of  death.  Her  story 
was  ridiculed,  but  a  few  nights  afterward  strange 
knockings  were  heard  in  different  parts  of  the  house. 
As,  according  to  vulgar  superstition,  such  sounds  were 
never  heard  by  the  person  whose  death  tliey  betokened, 
the  family  said  nothing  to  their  father,  because  he  had 


SUPERNATURAL   NOISES.  161 

not  heard  the  noises  himself,  and  they  feared  to  alarm 
him  for  his  own  life.  At  length,  however,  the  disturb- 
ances became  so  alarming  that  none  of  the  household 
dared  to  be  alone,  and  Mrs.  Wesley  informed  her  hus- 
band. The  sounds  consisted  of  loud  rumblings  above 
stairs  or  below",  a  clatter  among  bottles,  as  if  they  had 
been  suddenly  dashed  to  pieces,  the  footsteps  of  a  man 
going  up  stairs  or  down  at  all  hours  of  the  night,  sounds 
like  that  of  dancing  in  an  emjDty  room,  the  door  of 
which  was  locked,  and  a  knocking  about  the  beds  at 
night,  and  in  different  parts  of  the  house.  Rats  inside 
the  house  and  mischievous  jDersons  without  were  alter- 
nately the  exiDlanations  given  by  the  rector  and  Mrs. 
Wesley  to  the  children  and  servants.  One  night  he 
was  himself  awakened  by  nine  distinct  and  loud 
knocks,  which  seemed  to  be  in  the  adjoining  room,  with 
a  pause  at  every  third  stroke.  He  searched,  but  find- 
ing no  one,  called  in  a  large  mastiff  for  security.  But 
the  dog,  which  upon  the  first  disturbance  had  barked 
violently,  was  ever  af  terw^ard  cowed  by  it,  and  seeming 
more  terrified  than  any  of  the  children,  came  whining 
himself  to  his  master  and  mistress,  as  if  to  seek  their 
protection.  When  the  man-servant,  Robin  Brown, 
took  the  mastiff  to  his  room  at  night,  as  soon  as  the 
latch  begun  to  jar  as  usual  the  dog  crept  into  bed,  and 
barked  and  howled  with  nervous  distress.  But,  as 
Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  observes  upon  this  incident, 
"  Dogs  are  often  seen  to  catch  fear  from  their  owners." 
Mrs.  Wesley  seems  now  to  have  been  convinced  that 
the  noises  were  supernatural,  and  she  begged  her  hus- 
band to  "  try  the  spmt"  by  questioning  it.  One 
night,   therefore,   after  several  deep  groans  had  been 


162  THE   MOTHER   OF   JOLX    WESLEY. 

lieard,  lie  asked  it  solemnly  if  anything  liad  happened 
to  his  three  absent  sons,  esj^ecially  the  eldest,  Samuel, 
whose  spirit  he  su]3posed  it  might  possibly  be,  in  case 
the  young  man  had  died  suddenly.  Father,  mother, 
and  sisters  were  reassured,  however,  by  the  rappings 
or  silences  that  followed.  Henceforth  the  beautiful 
and  lively  Emilia  nicknamed  the  spirit,  "  Old  Jeffrey/' 
and  the  children  ceased  to  be  so  much  afraid  of  the 
phenomena,  although  on  one  occasion  the  rector 
testifies  that  on  his  asking  it  into  his  study  after  calling 
it  "  a  deaf  and  dumb  devil,*"  the  spirit  obeyed  seem- 
ingly in  bad  humor,  for  Mr.  Wesley  was  pushed  vio- 
lently against  the  wall  by  it  after  entering.  This  oc- 
curred to  him  three  times,  but  to  no  one  else  except 
Emilia,  against  whom  a  door  was  jDUshed  violently 
when  there  was  no  one  outside.  The  latches  were  fre- 
quently lifted  up,  the  windows  clattered,  and  all  the 
iron  and  brass  rung  and  jarred  when  this  familiar  sx)ii  it 
was  around. 

As  these  phenomena  are  those  of  modern  Spiritual- 
ism in  its  more  eccentric  forms,  so  the  explanation  of 
them  is  equally  difficult.  Isaac  Taylor  tries  to  laugh  the 
spirit  out  of  court,  but  the  accounts  of  the  rector  and 
Mrs,  Wesley  seem  too  serious  and  circumstantial  to  be 
ridiculed.  Dr.  Priestley  pronounced  it  "  perhaps  the 
best  authenticated  and  best  told  story  of  the  kind  that 
is  anywhere  extant."  Southey  says  that  "  the  testi- 
mony upon  which  i  t  rests  is  far  too  strong  to  be  set 
aside,  because  of  the  strangeness  of  the  relation,''  and 
that  "  such  things  may  be  preternatural  and  yet  not 
miraculous  ;  they  may  be  not  in  the  ordinary  course  of 
nature,  and  yet  imply  no  alteration  of  its  laws."     S.  T. 


LETTERS  OF  MOTHER  AND  SON.  163 

Coleridge  pronounced  the  whole  thing  a  conspiracy  of 
the  men-  and  maid- servants. 

John  Wesley,  who  was  just  beginning  his  career  at 
Oxford  when  the  opinion  he  had  already  formed  that 
the  E]3worth  manifestations  were  of  supernatural 
origin,  received  a  strange  confirmation  by  an  adventure 
of  his  own,  which  he  narrates  in  a  letter  to  his  mother. 
He  tells  her  that  a  Mr.  Barnesley,  and  two  other  of  his 
fellow-students,  had  recently  seen  an  apparition  in  a 
field  adjoining  Oxford,  and  that  it  had  since  been  ascer- 
tained that  Barnesley' s  mother  had  died  in  Ireland  at 
the  very  moment  when  the  spectre  had  been  witnessed. 

John  Wesley  was  always  a  firm  believer  in  the 
supernatural,  and  what  has  been  called  "  the  night  side 
of  nature."  Some  critics  have  depreciated  him  as  too 
superstitious.  These  strange  occurrences  at  Epworth 
no  doubt  set  him  to  thinking,  and  he  found  even  in  the 
New  Testament  much  to  confirm  the  belief  in  dreams, 
apparitions,  and  preternatural  phenomena.  His  mother, 
with  the  philosoi^hic  wisdom  which  was  so  great  a 
feature  of  her  mental  character,  writes  to  him  in 
answer : 

"  Dear  Jackey,  the  story  of  Mr.  Barnesley  has 
afforded  me  many  curious  speculations.  I  do  not 
doubt  the  fact,  but  I  cannot  understand  why  these  ap- 
paritions are  permitted.  If  they  were  allowed  to 
speak  to  us,  and  we  had  strength  to  bear  such  con- 
verse ;  if  they  had  commission  to  inform  us  of  anything 
relating  to  their  invisible  world  that  would  be  of  any 
use  to  us  in  this ;  if  they  would  instruct  tis  how  to 
avoid  danger,  or  put  us  in  a  way  of  being  wiser  and 
better,  there  would  be  sense  in  it ;  but  to  appear  for  no 


164  THE  MOTHER   OF  JOHN   WESLEY. 

end  we  know  of,  unless  to  frighten  people  almost  ont 
of  their  wits,  seems  altogether  unreasonable. " 

The  sensible  judgment  she  here  expresses  is  about 
the  conclusion  at  which  the  more  judicious  have  ar- 
rived, touching  the  "  spiritual  manifestations"  that 
have  troubled  the  world  for  the  past  thirty  years. 

But,  indeed,  all  Mrs.  Wesley's  letters  upon  every 
subject  breathe  the  same  candid  and  judicious  spirit. 
The  letters  of  very  talented  women  are  sometimes  their 
best  performances,  and  those  of  Susannah  Wesley  will 
bear  comparison  for  high  princii)le  and  sterling  sense 
with  those  of  any  mother' s  letters  to  her  children  with 
which  we  are  acquainted.  She  writes  to  her  illustrous 
son  while  he  is  at  Oxford,  of  j)redestination,  which  she 
rejects  as  decidedly  as  he  did  ;  of  the  lawfulness  of 
worldly  pleasures  ;  and  even  of  love,  her  letter  upon 
which  Adam  Clarke  declares  "  would  be  a  gem  even  in 
the  best  written  treatise  on  the  powers  and  j)assions  of 
the  human  mind."  In  this  letter  she  says  :  "Suffer 
now  a  word  of  advice.  However  curious  you  may  be 
in  searching  into  the  nature  or  in  distinguishing  the 
properties  of  the  passions  or  virtues  of  human  kind, 
for  your  own  private  satisfaction,  be  very  cautious  in 
giving  nice  distinctions  in  public  assemblies  ;  for  it 
does  not  answer  the  true  end  of  preaching,  wliicli  is  to 
amend  men's  lives,  and  not  to  fill  their  heads  with  un- 
profitable speculations.  And  after  all  that  can  be  said, 
every  affection  of  the  soul  is  better  known  by  experi- 
ence than  by  any  description  tliat  can  be  given  of  it. 
An  honest  man  will  more  easily  apprehend  what  is 
meant  by  being  zealous  for  God  against  sin,  when  he 
hears  what  are  the  properties  and  effects  of  true  zeal, 


"  AN    UNPROFITABLE   SERVANT."  165 

than  the  most  accurate  description  of  its  essence." 
Mrs.  Wesley,  as  Adam  Clarke  has  remarked,  "never 
considered  herself  discharged  from  the  care  of  her  chil- 
dren. Into  all  situations  she  followed  them  with  her 
Ijrayers  and  counsels,  and  her  sons,  even  when  at  the 
University,  found  the  utility  of  her  wise  and  x)arental 
instructions.  They  proposed  to  her  all  their  doubts, 
and  consulted  her  in  all  their  difficulties." 

If  religion  consist  in  the  faithful  discharge  of  aU  the 
duties  of  life  in  the  fear  of  God,  and  the  love  of  the 
Saviour,  it  would  not  be  easy  to  find  a  woman  with  a 
better  claim  to  the  title  of  Christian  than  Susannah 
Wesley.  But  her  letters,  toward  the  close  of  her  long 
and  useful  life,  indicate  that  she  is  not  satisfied  vrith. 
her  own  spiritual  condition.  "  When  ye  have  done  all 
that  is  commanded  you,"  said  Christ,  "say.  We  are 
unprofitable  servants,"  and  she  writes  to  John  Wesley, 
"  You  did  well  to  correct  that  fond  desire  of  dying  be- 
fore me,  since  you  do  not  know  what  work  God  may 
have  for  you  to  do  ere  you  leave  the  world.  ...  I 
should  be  glad  to  have  you  with  me  when  I  die.  But 
as  I  have  been  an  unprofitable  servant,  during  the 
course  of  a  long  life,  I  have  no  reason  to  hope  for  so 
great  an  honor,  so  high  a  favor  as  to  be  employed  in 
doing  our  Lord  any  service  in  the  article  of  death." 
At  other  times  we  find  her  less  despondent,  and  more 
hopeful  under  the  consciousness  of  duty  done.  "I 
often  think,"  she  writes  to  him,  "  that  were  He  always 
present  to  our  mind,  as  we  are  present  to  Him,  there 
would  be  no  pain  nor  sense  of  misery.  I  have  long 
since  chosen  Him  as  my  only  good  ;  my  all  ;  my 
j)leasure,  my  happiness  in  this  world,  as  well  as  in  the 


106  THE   MOTHER   OF   JOHN    WESLEY. 

world  to  come.  And  although  I  have  not  been  so 
faithful  to  His  grace  as  I  ought  to  have  been,  yet  I 
feel  my  spirit  adheres  to  its  choice,  and  aims  daily  at 
cleaving  steadfastly  unto  God.  Yet  one  thing  often 
troubles  me,  that,  notwithstanding  I  know  that  while 
we  are  present  with  the  body,  we  are  absent  from  the 
Lord  ;  notwithstanding  I  have  no  taste  nor  relish  left 
for  anything  the  world  calls  pleasure,  yet  I  do  not  long 
to  go  home,  as  in  reason  I  ought  to  do.  This  often 
shocks  me  ;  and  as  I  constantly  pray,  almost  without 
ceasing,  for  thee,  my  son,  so  I  beg  you  likewise  to  pray 
for  me,  that  God  would  make  me  better,  and  take  me 
at  the  best." 

This  discontent  with  her  oa\ti  spiritual  condition  dur- 
ing her  past  life  culminated  in  what  the  Methodists 
would  call  her  conversion,  at  seventy  years  of  age. 
John  Wesley  had  reached  the  climax  of  his  zeal,  and 
was  preaching  in  the  open  air  at  Moorfields  and  Ken- 
nington  Common.  His  mother  apx)roved  his  course, 
and  told  him  that  she  had  never  until  recently  felt  the 
present  forgiveness  of  sins,  or  God's  spirit  bearing  wit- 
ness with  our  spirit.  But  when  she  had  taken  the 
communion,  and  her  son-in-law,  Mr.  Hall,  had  delivered 
the  cup  to  her  with  the  solemn  words  of  the  Prayer- 
book,  she  had  felt  struck  to  the  heart,  and  then  knew 
that  God  for  Christ's  sake  had  forgiven  her  all  her 
sins. 

Her  eldest  son,  Samuel,  who  never  sympathized 
with  what  he  deemed  the  schismatical  course  of  his 
brothers,  wrote  to  her :  "  It  was  with  exceeding  con- 
cern and  grief  I  heard  you  had  countenanced  a  sj^read- 
ing  delusion,  so  far  as  to  be  one  of  Jack's  congregation. 


HER  EPITAPH.  IGT 

Is  it  not  enough  that  I  am  bereft  of  both  my  brothers, 
but  must  my  mother  follow  too  ?  I  earnestly  beseech 
the  Almighty  to  preserve  you  from  joining  a  schism  at 
the  close  of  your  life,  as  you  were  unfortunately  en- 
gaged in  one  at  the  beginning  of  it.  They  boast  of  you 
already  as  a  disciple.'' 

Whether  they  boasted  of  her  supposed  conversion 
while  she  lived  or  not,  they  alluded  to  it  in  the  epi- 
taph which  they  placed  upon  her  tombstone,  calling 
Iier  long  and  Christian  life  ' '  a  legal  night  of  seventy 
years,"  and  proclaiming  in  the  third  stanza  her  conver- 
sion as  we  have  narrated  it.  Mrs.  Wesley  died  July 
23d,  1742.  Her  last  words  were  :  "  Children,  as  soon  as 
I  am  released,  sing  a  psalm  of  praise  to  God."  The  epi- 
taph will  aptly  conclude  this  sketch  of  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  mothers  of  modern  times. 

This  is  the  inscription  : 

"  Here  lies  the  body  of  Mrs.  Susannali  "Wesley,  the  youngest  and 
last  surviving  daughter  of  Dr.  Samuel  Annesley. 

"  In  sure  and  steadfast  hope  to  rise 
And  claim  her  mansion  in  the  skies, 
A  Christian  here  her  flesh  laid  down, 
The  cross  exchanging  for  a  crown. 

*'  True  daughter  of  afiiiction  she, 
Inured  to  pain  and  misery, 
Mourn'd  a  long  night  of  grief  and  fears, 
A  legal  night  of  seventy  years. 

"  The  Father  then  revealed  His  Son, 
Him  in  the  broken  bread  made  known  ; 
She  knew  and  felt  her  sins  forgiven, 
And  found  the  earnest  of  her  Heaven. 


168  THE  MOTHER  OF  JOHN    WESLEY. 

"  Meet  for  the  fellowship  above, 
She  heard  the  call,  '  Arise,  my  Love  ! ' 
'  I  come,'  her  dying  looks  replied. 
And,  lamb-like  as  her  Lord,  she  died.'* 


CHAELES  LAMB'S  MOTHER. 

Charles  Lamb's  mother  is  perhaps  the  least  con- 
spicuous of  all  the  mothers  of  modern  men  of  genius. 
Indeed,  she  is  chietly  remembered  as  the  victim  of  her 
gentle  daughter's  insanity,  who  in  one  of  her  paroxysms 
deprived  her  of  life.  Both  his  parents  were  of  humble 
origin,  his  father  having  begun  life  as  a  menial  servant 
and  risen  to  be  scrivener  in  a  lawyer's  office.  His 
mother  was  the  daughter  of  a  worthy  but  common- 
place woman,  who  was  for  many  years  the  housekeeper 
in  a  gentleman's  family.  "  But  although  of  humble 
station,  his  parents,"  says  Sir  Thomas  Noon  Talfourd, 
"  were  endued  with  sentiments  and  with  manners  which 
might  well  become  the  gentlest  blood  ;  and  fortune, 
w^hich  had  denied  them  wealth,  enabled  them  to  bestow 
on  their  children  some  of  the  happiest  intellectual 
advantages  which  wealth  ever  confers."  His  father, 
Mr.  John  Lamb,  who  came  to  London  when  a  little 
boy  from  Lincoln,  entered  into  the  service  of  Mr.  Salt, 
one  of  the  benchers  of  the  Inner  Temple,  a  widower, 
who,  growing  old  within  its  precincts,  was  enabled  to 
appreciate  and  reward  his  devotedness  and  intelli- 
gence ;  and  to  whom  he  became,  in  the  language  of  his 
son,  "his.  clerk,  his  good-servant,  his  dresser,  his 
friend,  his  flapper,  his  guide,  stopwatch,  auditor, 
treasurer."  Charles  Lamb  has  given  the  characters  of 
his  father  and  of  Mr.  Salt  in  one  of  the  most  exquisite  of 


170  CHARLES  LAMB'S  MOTHER. 

the  "  Essays  of  Elia,"  entitled  "  The  Old  Benchers  of 
the  Inner  Temple."  John  Lamb  had  some  literary 
talent  and  ambition,  and  j)nblished  some  poetical 
effusions  which  he  had  written  to  grace  the  festivities 
of  the  Benefit  Society,  of  which  he  was  a  member,  with 
the  title  of  "  Poetical  Pieces  on  Several  Occasions.'' 
Elizabeth  Lamb,  his  wife,  was  a  woman  of  such  ma- 
tronly and  commanding  appearance,  that  it  was  said 
of  her  by  one  of  Charles  Lamb's  playmates,  that  ''  she 
might  be  taken  for  a  sister  of  Mrs.  Siddons. "  They 
had  three  children,  John,  Mary,  and  Charles,  of  whom 
John  was  twelve  years  and  Mary  ten  years  older  than 
Charles.  The  tender  devotion  of  Cliarles  to  Mary 
Lamb,  and  the  deep  affection  that  subsisted  between 
them,  is  an  oft-told  tale.  From  which  of  her  parents 
Mary  inherited  her  occasional  insanity  does  not  ap- 
pear. There  was  as  little  in  the  mother  to  account  for 
the  mental  disease  of  the  daughter  as  there  was  in  the 
father  to  account  for  the  genius  of  the  son. 

Like  her  husband,  whose  junior  she  was  by  many 
years,  Mrs.  Lamb  was  fond  of  pleasure.  Her  tastes  were 
wholly  different  from  those  of  her  two  sensitive  chil- 
dren, whom  she  did  not  in  the  least  comprehend.  She 
lacked  utterly  in  intuition  and  imagination,  and  hence 
was  cruel  oftentimes  to  her  nervous  daughter. 
Charles,  in  writing  of  her  many  years  after  her  death, 
said,  "  Her  mother  (Mary's)  loved  her,  with  a  mother's 
love  ;  but  in  opinion,  in  feeling  and  sentiment  and  dis- 
position, bore  so  distant  a  resemblance  to  her  daughter 
that  she  never  understood  her  right — never  could  be- 
lieve how  much  she  loved  her — but  met  her  caresses, 
her  i)ro testations  of  filial  affection,  too  frequently  with 


THE    HOUSEHOLD.  171 

coldness  and  repulse.  Still,  she  was  a  good  mother. 
God  forbid  I  should  think  of  her  but  most  respect- 
fully, most  affectionately." 

]^o  doubt  he  tried  sincerely,  and  in  a  sense  he  did 
love  his  mother,  and  because  of  her  tragic  death  he 
held  her  in  tender  memory  ;  but  Mrs.  Lamb"  s  nature 
was  so  widely  different  from  her  son's  that  he  felt  no 
deex3  sentiment  of  love  toward  her.  She  might  have 
lived  nearer  to  her  children,  had  not  her  mother,  a 
painfully  practical  and  commonplace,  though  worthy 
]3erson,  resided  with  her  and  influenced  her  actions. 
Later  there  came  to  the  home  of  the  Lambs  a  sister  of 
Mr.  Lamb,  who  for  twenty  years  was  an  added  note  of 
discord  in  that  otherwise  inharmonious  family.  The 
household  was  a  discordant  one  in  itself,  but  it  might 
have  been  a  happier  one  had  not  these  outside  elements 
been  introduced  into  it.  When  the  mother  would 
have  been  tender,  her  mother  chided  her  for  spoiling 
her  children,  and  little  Mary  grew  up  accustomed  to 
rebuke  and  rebuff,  where  she  turned  for  sympathy  and 
caress.  The  affection  between  the  brother  and  sister 
grew  and  strengthened,  and  very  early  in  their  youth 
they  learned  to  suppress  their  longings  for  the  society 
of  their  mother,  and  to  risk  no  manifestation  of  feeling 
that  would  be  repelled. 

They  were  poor  and  not  over-ambitious  parents,  and 
their  outlook  upon  life  was  limited  and  confined.  Poor 
Charles  and  Mary,  with  their  fine  sensibilities  and  love 
of  the  beautiful,  tried  hard  to  see  everything  in  its  best 
life,  and  to  look  upon  their  home  circle  with  fond  pride. 
Their  imaginations  gilded  the  coarse  outlines  of  vul- 
garity and  poverty  with  a  sunny  brightness,  and  right 


172  CHARLES    LAMB'S   MOTHER. 

resolutely  they  tried  to  believe  that  things  were  what 
they  could  make  them  seem,  not  what  they  were.  The 
strain  was  too  great  for  the  girl,  comj^elled  all  her  days 
to  be  in  constant  contact  with  those  about  her.  She 
toiled  incessantly,  hoping  through  occupation  to  find 
courage  and  peace.  The  father  grew  ill,  and  the  mother 
had  long  been  in  feeble  health.  Mary  was  earning  her 
own  support  and  that  of  the  others,  in  part,  with  her 
needle,  and  her  health  became  impaired.  Then  the 
mother's  illness  increased,  and  added  to  the  cares  of  the 
day  was  the  nursing  that  had  to  be  given  the  sufferer  a 
part  of  each  night.  The  eldest  brother,  John,  a  wholly 
selfish  fellow,  who  would  not  live  at  home  when  he  was 
well,  returned  there  to  be  nursed  through  an  attack  of 
illness,  and  Mary' s  burdens  grew  heavier  with  each  suc- 
ceeding week.  Her  nervous  excitability  increased,  and 
there  were  alarming  symptoms  of  insanity  exhibited. 
But  she  rallied  quickly,  and  each  time  redoubled  her 
efforts  for  those  about  her.  Finally  there  came  a  time 
when  she  did  not  rally,  and  in  an  acute  and  sudden  at- 
tack of  frenzy  she  caught  up  a  knife  lying  on  the  table, 
chased  a  young  girl  who  was  sewing  with  her,  and 
plunged  it  into  her  mother's  breast,  killing  her  in- 
stantly. The  father,  then  almost  in  his  dotage,  in  at- 
tempting to  take  the  knife  from  her,  was  slightly 
wounded. 

Long  afterward,  when  recovering  from  one  of  her 
periodical  attacks,  and  while  in  the  asylum,  she 
wrote  these  pathetic  words  of  her  mother  in  a  letter 
to  her  brother:  "At  midnight,  when  I  happen  to 
awake,  the  nurse  sleeping  by  the  side  of  me,  with  the 
noise  of  the  poor  mad  people  around  me,  I  have  no 


MARY    LAMB'S    LETTERS.  173 

fear.  The  spirit  of  my  mother  seems  to  descend  and 
smile  upon  me,  and  bid  me  live  to  enjoy  the  life  and 
reason  which  the  Almighty  has  given  me.  I  shall  see 
her  again  in  Heaven  ;  she  will  then  understand  me 
better.  My  grandmother,  too,  will  understand  me 
better,  and  will  then  say  no  more,  as  she  used  to  do, 
'  Polly,  what  are  those  poor,  crazy,  moythered  brains 
of  yours  thinking  of  always  ? '  " 

In  one  of  her  letters  Mary  Lamb  speaks  of  her 
mother  as  "  a  perfect  gentlewoman,"  but  the  designa- 
tion is  not  correct.  Mrs.  Lamb  had  no  claim  whatever 
to  the  title,  and  only  the  partiality  of  her  daughter  led 
her  to  use  the  expression.  Had  she  been  a  gentle- 
v.^oman,  it  would  be  easier  to  explain  the  presence  in 
her  two  children  of  rare  qualities  of  mind  and  heart, 
which  have  not  been  accounted  for,  and  cannot  be  by 
the  law  of  heredity  in  this  case.  On  the  subject  of  her 
mother  Mary  Lamb  was  often  morbid  ;  she  grew,  how- 
ever, to  speak  of  her  with  composure,  and  in  later  years 
with  almost  a  certain  hope  of  seeing  her  again,  as  she 
shows  in  these  lines  to  her  brother,  which  he  translated 
"  almost  literally,"  he  says,  and  with  which  is  closed 
this  fragment. 

"  Thou  and  I,  dear  friend, 
With  filial  recognition  sweet,  shall  know- 
One  day  the  face  of  our  dear  mother  in  Heaven ; 
And  her  remembered  looks  of  love  shall  greet 
With  answering  looks  of  love,  her  placid  smiles 
Meet  with  a  smile  as  placid,  and  her  hand 
With  drops  of  fondness  wet,  nor  fear  repulse." 


THACKERAY'S  MOTHER. 

Thackeray's  mother,  like  Lamb's,  can  claim  but  a 
brief  mention.  He  was  a  man  of  many  minds,  and  it 
is  impossible  to  trace  his  varying  characteristics  to 
their  paternal  source.  Thackeray  was  born  at  Cal- 
cutta on  July  18th,  1811.  His  father  and  grandfather 
were  in  the  Indian  civil  service  ;  his  mother  was  Anne 
Becher,  whose  father  was  also  in  the  service  of  the 
East  India  Company.  She  was  married  early  in  India, 
and  was  only  nineteen  when  her  son,  William  Make- 
peace Thackeray,  was  born.  She  was  left  a  widow  in 
1816,  with  this  only  child,  and  was  married  a  few  years 
afterward  to  Major  Henry  Carmichael  Smyth,  with 
whom  Thackeray  lived  on  terms  of  affectionate  inter- 
course till  the  Major  died.  "All  who  knew  William 
Makepeace  Thackeray,"  says  Anthony  Trollope,  "re- 
membered his  mother  well,  a  handsome,  spare,  gray- 
haired  lady,  whom  Thackeray  treated  with  a  courtly 
deference  as  well  as  constant  affection.  There  was, 
however,  something  of  discrepancy  between  them  as  to 
matters  of  religion.  Mrs.  Carmichael  Smyth  was  dis- 
posed to  the  somewhat  austere  observance  of  the  evan- 
gelical section  of  the  Church.  Such  certainly  never 
became  the  case  with  her  son.  There  was  disagree- 
ment on  the  subject,  and  jirobably  unhappiness  at  in- 
tervals, but  never,  I  think,  quarrelling.     Thackeray's 


THACKERAY'S   MOTHER  175 

house  was  his  mother's  home  whenever  she  pleased  to 
live  in  it,  and  the  home  also  of  his  stepfather. 

"It  was  a  newspaper  enterprise,  entered  into  with 
this  same  stepfather,  that  cost  poor  Thackeray  his 
little  fortune  of  five  hundred  pounds  a  year.  Some  of 
the  genius  of  Thackeray  has  survived  in  his  eldest 
daughter.  His  marriage  was  a  most  unhappy  one, 
through  no  fault  of  either  his  or  his  wife's,  but  owing 
to  the  mental  illness  of  the  latter.  His  daughters  were 
all  in  all  to  him,  and  many  will  remember  his  touching 
reference  to  them  in  '  The  White  Squall.' 

"  'But  when  the  storm  was  ended, 
Its  fury  all  expended, 
And  as  the  sunrise  splendid 

Came  blushing  o'er  the  sea, 
I  thought  that  day  was  breaking, 
My  little  girls  were  waking, 
And  smiling,  and  making 

A  prayer  at  home  for  me.'  " 

But  his  home  was  broken  up  by  his  wife' s  affliction, 
when  their  children  were  little  more  than  babies,  so 
far  as  society  was  concerned.  It  was  in  1837,  when  he 
was  twenty-six  years  old,  that  Thackeray  married  Isa- 
bella, daughter  of  Colonel  Matthew  Shawe.  She  be- 
came ill,  and  her  mind  failed  her.  "There  was  a 
period,"  says  Trollope,  "  during  which  he  would  not 
believe  that  her  illness  was  more  than  illness,  and 
then  he  clung  to  her  and  waited  upon  her  with  an  as- 
siduity of  affection  which  only  made  his  task  the  more 
painful  to  him.  At  last  it  became  evident  that  she 
should  live  in  the  companionship  of  some  one  with 
whom  her  life  might  be  altogether  quiet,  and  she  has 


176  AN   INSANE   WIFE. 

been  since  domiciled  with  a  lady  with  whom  she  has 
been  happy.  Thus  she  was,  after  but  a  few  years  of 
married  life,  taken  away  from  him,  and  he  became  as 
it  were  a  widower  to  the  end  of  his  days.  Three 
daughters  were  born  to  them,  of  whom  Jane,  the  sec- 
ond, died  when  a  child.  The  eldest  became  Mrs.  Rich- 
mond Ritchie,  and  the  youngest  Mrs.  Leslie  Stephen. 
The  last  named  died  a  few  years  ago.' ' 

At  the  time  of  the  publication  of  Charlotte  Bronte' s 
famous  novel,  "  Jane  Eyre,"  the  report  was  circulated 
in  London  that  the  writer  had  satirized  Thackeray 
in  the  character  of  Rochester,  and  had  even  obtruded 
on  the  great  sorrow  of  his  life.  The  falsity  and  the 
statement  were  soon  made  public,  but  for  a  time  liter- 
ary and  social  London  accepted  as  a  fact  that  which 
the  character  of  "  Currer  Bell"  alone  was  sufficient  of 
itself  to  make  impossible,  even  had  she  not  vehemently 
contradicted  the  story. 


CORNELIA,  THE  MOTHER  OF  THE  GRACCHj.. 

Of  the  many  thousands  to  whom  "  the  mother  of 
the  Gracchi"  is  a  familiar  phrase,  very  few  compara- 
tively know  anything  about  the  Gracchi  or  their 
mother.  Yet  Cornelia  may  be  called  the  greatest  of  all 
Roman  matrons,  the  daughter  of  the  greatest  Roman 
general  of  his  time,  the  wife  of  a  vii'tuous  and  distin- 
guished statesman,  and  the  mother  of  two  sons,  who, 
with  one  daughter,  were  all  that  reached  maturity 
out  of  a  family  of  twelve  children,  whose  brilliant 
talents  and  tragic  endings  form  two  of  the  most  thrill- 
ing chapters  in  the  history  of  the  later  Roman  Com- 
monwealth. If  they  derived  their  brilliant  qualities 
from  her,  she  in  turn  derived  them  from  her  father, 
Publius  Cornelius  Scipio,  to  whom  the  agnomen  of 
"  Africanus"  was  added  because  he  vanquished  Hanni- 
bal and  ended  the  second  Carthaginian  war  at  the 
battle  of  Zama.  The  pride  of  Cornelia  in  her  sons 
Tiberius  Sempronius  Gracchus  and  Caius  Gracchus  was 
shown  by  the  fact  that  she  accounted  her  maternal  rela- 
tionship to  them  her  supreme  claim  to  honor  and  re- 
spect. When  left  a  widow  in  the  prime  of  womanhood, 
she  refused  many  advantageous  offers  of  a  second  mar- 
riage through  the  honorable  pride  she  took  in  her  hus- 
band's memory  and  in  the  education  of  her  children  ; 
and  when  the  great  King  Ptolemy  himself,  charmed 
with  her  virtues,  intellect,  and  accomplishments,  offered 


i78         CORNELIA,   THE  MOTHER  OF   THE   GRACCHI. 

to  make  her  Ms  Queen  and  the  sharer  of  his  kingdom, 
she  refused  to  exchange  Roman  widow' s  weeds  for  the 
splendors  of  a  court.  When  a  companion  lady,  notic- 
ing the  severe  plainness  of  her  apparel,  asked  her, 
"Where  are  your  jewels?"  Cornelia  introduced  her 
sons  and  said,  with  a  true  mother's  pride,  that  they 
were  the  only  Jewels  she  could  boast  of  possessing. 
And  when  those  sons  were  dead,  both  of  them  mur- 
dered at  the  Capitol,  though  at  different  times,  by  the 
exclusive  class  of  landed  plutocrats  whom  they  had 
offended,  and  their  myrmidons,  she  bore  her  grief 
heroically,  and  when  a  friend  condoled  with  her,  re- 
plied, ' '  The  woman  who  had  the  Gracchi  for  her  sons 
cannot  be  considered  unfortunate."  No  stronger 
proof  can  be  adduced  of  her  being  esteemed  the  noblest 
of  Roman  matrons  than  the  fact  that  at  her  death  the 
people  erected  a  brass  statue  to  her  memory,  bearing 
on  it  the  legend,  "  Cornelia,  the  Mother  of  the 
Gracchi." 

Although  both  of  her  sons  were  really  murdered  by 
a  mob,  and  although  the  political  action  which  led  to 
this  tragic  and  violent  end  has  not  been  generally  ap- 
proved even  by  the  modern  historians  of  Rome, 
Cornelia  regarded  them  as  patriotic  martyrs,  and  felt  it 
an  honor  to  have  given  the  lives  of  two  such  sons  to 
the  Commonwealth.  The  same  feeling  supported  many 
a  heroic  American  mother  when  the  tidings  reached  her 
that  her  darling  boy — sometimes  her  only  one  and  she 
a  widow— had  been  killed  on  the  field  of  battle.  Her 
anguish  might  be  great,  but  she  subdued  it  with  the 
thought  that  she  was  the  mother  of  a  hero  and  a  martyr. 
The  same  patriotic  j)ride  supported  her  in  her  widow- 


THE   FATHER   OF   CORNELIA.  ITO 

hood  as  that  which  forbade  Cornelia  to  give  way  to 
grief,  and  to  think  herself  fortunate  in  being  the  mother 
of  Tiberius  and  Cains.  Gracchus. 

In  estimating  the  character  of  this  noble  Roman  lady, 
account  must  be  taken  of  the  heroic  stock  she  came 
from  and  of  the  times  in  which  she  lived,  in  many  re- 
spects so  different  from  our  own.  Her  father  was  the 
most  distinguished  member  of  the  illustrious  family  of 
the  Scipios.  Those  who  have  read  the  majestic  narra- 
tive of  the  Second  Punic  War,  contained  in  the  Second 
Decade  of  Livy's  "  History  of  Rome,"  will  remember 
how  great  a  part  he  and  his  brother  played  in  the  con- 
duct of  the  war.  It  was  the  father  of  Cornelia  who, 
after  the  disastrous  battle  of  Cannae,  when  the  slaughter 
of  the  Roman  knights  was  so  great  and  the  panic 
created  at  Rome  by  the  news  of  the  catastrophe  was  so 
widespread,  that  if  Hannibal,  instead  of  spending  some 
time  in  "  masterly  inactivity' '  and  gratulations  over  bis 
decisive  victory,  had  marched  directly  to  the  gates  of 
Rome,  there  is  good  reason  to  believe  that  he  could 
have  surprised  and  overpowered  the  Senate  and  have 
taken  the  city — it  was  Publius  Cornelius  Scipio,  we 
say,  who  prevented  the  desertion  of  the  young  nobles 
from  the  army  and  the  Capitol,  and  who  .restored 
courage  to  the  shattered  and  disorganized  legions.  On 
an  earlier  occasion  it  is  reported  of  him  that  he  saved  the 
life  of  his  father  at  l\\e  battle  of  the  Ticinus.  Publius 
Cornelius  Scipio  was  only  twenty -four  years  of  ag<3 
when  he  was  appointed  iiroconsul  in  Spain,  and  took 
command  of  the  legions  that  were  sent  to  opjiose  the 
forces  of  Hannil)al  in  that  country.  Most  young  gener- 
als at  his  age,  vain  of  their  new  dijrnitv  and  the  absolute 


180  CORNELIA,   THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   GRACCHI. 

power  intrusted  to  them  for  the  time,  would  have  been 
impetuous  and  foolhardy,  and  rushed  eagerly  to  battle 
on  the  first  sight  of  the  enemy.  Not  so  did  the  fatlier 
of  Cornelia.  He  had  prudence  and  foresight  as  w^ell  as 
courage,  and  much  as  he  longed  to  meet  in  deadly  com- 
bat the  Napoleon  of  that  age,  who  was  bound  when  yet  a 
lad  by  his  fatlier,  Hamilcar,  at  the  sacred  altars  of  the 
gods  in  Cartilage,  to  wage  against  Rome  a  never-ending 
warfare,  and  to  cherish  against  the  Roman  people  an  un- 
dying hatred,  yet  he  counted  the  cost ;  and  knowing 
that  the  army  of  Hannibal  was  far  greater  than  his  own 
and  that  it  was  flushed,  like  those  of  France  under  the 
Corsican  adventurer,  with  rej^eated  victories,  he  avoided 
the  hazard  of  an  engagement,  and  contented  himself 
with  laying  siege  to  Nova  Carthage,  New  Carthage, 
now  the  commercial  port  of  Carthagena,  and  captured 
that  city  the  same  year.  This  was  in  the  year  210  B.C. 
Unlike  so  many  of  the  world's  heroes,  his  success  did 
not  render  him  vainglorious  nor  the  sense  of  power 
tyrannical.  New  Carthage  lay  wholly  at  the  mercy  of 
its  conqueror,  but  Publius  Scipio,  when  he  became 
master  of  the  city,  made  it  his  first  business  to  liberate 
the  Spanish  hostages  and  prisoners  of  Hannibal  whom 
he  found  shut  up  there.  Among  them  he  restored  to 
liberty  a  beautiful  Spanish  maiden  who  was  languish- 
ing in  prison.  From  such  episodes  as  this  we  gain  an 
insight  into  the  magnanimous  and  really  heroic  char- 
acter t)f  the  mother  of  Cornelia.  So  great  was  the 
admiration  wliich  his  conduct  excited  that  he  was  even 
offered  tlie  sovereignty  of  Spain,  but  as  a  true  repub- 
lican he  refused  to  accept  it.  To  be  the  general  of  a 
Roman  army  was  to  Publius  Scipio  a  greater  honor 


THE   BATTLE   OF   ZAMA.  181 

than  to  occupy  a  throne.  The  taking  of  'New  Carthage, 
however,  was  but  the  beginning  of  his  Spanish  cam- 
paign. During  the  ensuing  three  years  he  took  from 
the  grasp  of  Hannibal  every  city  in  Spain,  with  the 
exception  of  Gades,  now  Cadiz. 

All  this  time  the  ambition  of  this  great  general  was 
fixed  upon  Africa  as  the  scene  of  his  future  triumphs,  as 
it  actually  was.  In  order  to  prepare  the  way  for  the  in- 
vasion of  the  Carthaginian  territory,  he  entered  into  a 
secret  alliance  mth  Syphax,  King  of  Numidia,  who 
afterward  went  over. to  the  Carthaginian  side.  Publius 
returned  to  Rome  in  206  B.C.,  and  was  chosen  consul 
for  the  ensuing  year.  Sicily  was  assigned  him  as  his 
province,  and  his  prestige  as  a  commander  was  now  so 
great  that  he  easily  raised  an  army  of  volunteers,  and 
in  204  B.C.  crossed  over  into  Africa  and  began  the  siege 
of  Utica,  but  he  retired  into  winter  quarters  on  the 
approach  of  the  Carthaginian  general,  Hasdrubal, 
whom  Hannibal  had  sent  to  meet  him.  As  soon  as  the 
spring-time  offered  Sci^iio  a  further  opportunity,  he 
burned  by  stratagem  the  double  camp  of  the  enemy, 
and  destroyed  the  scattered  forces.  The  traitor  King 
Syphax  was  captured,  and  Creta  surrendered  to  the 
Roman  conqueror.  Later  on  he  encountered  the 
mighty  Hannibal  himself,  who  was  indeed  a  ' '  f oeman 
worthy  of  his  steel. "  The  battle  of  Zama,  in  wliich  Pub- 
lius Cornelius  Scipio  defeated  the  Carthaginian  general 
— one  of  the  greatest  military  commanders  the  world 
has  ever  seen — was  fought  on  October  19th,  202  B.C. 

In  the  following  year  a  treaty  of  peace  was  signed 
between  Rome  and  Carthage.  On  his  return  home  the 
father  of  Cornelia  received  the  greatest  triumph  that 


182  CORNELIA,   THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   GRACCHI. 

had  ever  been  witnessed  in  Rome.  Henceforth  the 
name  of  "  Africanus"  was  added  to  his  own,  much  as 
modern  generals  are  known  by  the  countries  or  scenes 
of  battle  that  have  made  them  famous  through  decisive 
victories.  "Vaulting  ambition  that  o'erleaps  itself 
and  falls  on  the  other  side"  was  not  a  weakness  of 
Scipio,  who  declined  many  of  the  honors  that  were 
offered  him.  He  rose,  however,  by  the  will  of  the 
people  to  be  censor  and  consul  the  second  time,  and  in 
193  B.C.  he  w^as  chosen  ambassador  to  the  court  of 
Antiochus,  King  of  Syria,  where  he  is  said  to  have  met 
his  old  oj)ponent  Hannibal.  It  is  certain  that  Publius 
Cornelius  Scipio  Africanus  died  in  183  B.C.,  the  same 
year  in  which  Hannibal  committed  suicide  at  the  age  of 
seventy. 

Great  men  seldom  escape  the  tongues  of  calumny  and 
the  machinations  of  slander.  Scipio  and  his  brother, 
Lucius  Cornelius  Scipio,  surnamed  Asiaticus,  who  was 
consul  in  109  b.c,  and  whom  he  accompanied  to  the 
war  in  Syria,  were  both  accused  of  misapiDropriating 
moneys  which  they  had  received  from  King  Antiochus. 
Cato  was  the  leading  spirit  among  the  accusers  of  the 
Scipios.  The  prosecution  of  Lucius  was  successful, 
but  the  influence  of  Cornelia's  husband,  Tiberius 
Sempronius  Gracchus  the  elder,  quashed  the  indict- 
ment against  his  father-in-law,  although,  for  jDolitical 
reasons,  they  were  never  on  cordial  terms  with  each 
other.  The  fickle  breath  of  poj)ularity,  however,  de- 
serted Scipio,  and  like  many  another  hero  who  has 
devoted  himself  to  his  country  to  find  it  ungrateful  in 
the  end,  Scipio  retired  from  Rome  and  public  life  to 
his  private  villa  at  Liternum,  where  he  died. 


MARRIAGE   OF   CORNELIA.  183 

Sucli  is  a  brief  acconnt  of  one  of  the  greatest  soldiers 
and  nobles  of  the  Roman  Rei)nblic  in  its  later  days, 
little  more  than  a  hundred  years  before  it  became  an 
Empire  under  the  ill-fated  Julius  and  the  succeeding 
Caesars.  It  will  be  seen  that  Cornelia,  who  was  so 
X3roud  of  being  the  mother  of  the  Gracchi,  had  no 
cause  to  blush  at  being  the  daughter  of  Scii^io.  From 
him  her  courage  and  her  taste  for  literature  were  de- 
rived, although  we  must  not  refuse  a  share  of  influence 
to  her  mother,  who  was  of  noble  birth  and  lineage, 
being  the  daughter  of  the  famous  Emilius  Paiilus. 

Cornelia  was  the  youngest  daughter  of  Publius  Cor- 
nelius Scipio,  and  was  married  at  an  early  age  to 
Tiberius  Sempronius  Gracchus,  who  was  many  years 
her  senior.  Comparatively  little  is  known  of  him,  and 
that  little,  which  is  derived  chiefly  from  Plutarch,  is 
not  very  reliable.  Speaking  of  the  Gracchi,  he  says  : 
"  They  were  the  sons  of  Tiberius  Gracchus,  who, 
though  he  had  been  once  censor,  twice  consul,  and  had 
twice  been  accorded  a  triumph,  yet  was  more  renowned 
and  esteemed  for  his  virtue  than  his  honors.  Upon  this 
account,  after  the  death  of  Scipio,  who  overthrew  Hanni- 
bal, he  was  thought  worthy  to  match  with  his  daugh- 
ter Cornelia,  though  there  had  besn  no  friendship  or 
familiarity  between  Scipio  and  him,  but  rather  the  con- 
trary," Other  authorities,  as  we  have  seen,  make  the 
marriage  to  have  taken  place  during  Scipio' s  lifetime, 
and  he  is  said  by  Livy  to  have  given  his  daughter  to 
Gracchus  because  the  latter  interfered  to  save  his 
brother  Lucius  Scipio  from  being  dragged  to  prison. 
It  is  certain  that  he  was  censor  in  169  B.C.,  and*  that  he 
favored  the  popular  party  in  the  politics  of  the  state. 


184         CORNELIA,   THE  MOTHER  OF  THE   GRACCHI. 

All  the  ancient  wTiters  are  fond  of  omens  and  i)rodigies, 
and  accordingly  Plutarch  adds  :  "  There  is  a  story  told, 
that  Gracchus  once  found  in  his  bedchamber  a  couple 
of  snakes,  and  that  the  soothsayers,  being  consulted 
concerning  the  prodigy,  advised  that  he  should  neither 
kill  them  both  nor  let  them  both  escape  ;  adding,  that 
if  the  male  serpent  was  killed,  Tiberius  should  die, 
and  if  the  female,  Cornelia  ;  and  that,  therefore, 
Tiberius,  who  extremely  loved  his  wife,  and  thought, 
besides,  that  it  was  much  more  his  part,  who  was  an 
old  man,  to  die,  than  it  was  hers,  who  as  yet  was  but  a 
young  woman,  killed  the  male  serpent,  and  let  the 
female  escape,  and  soon  after  himself  died,  leaving  be- 
hind him  twelve  children  born  to  him  by  Cornelia. 
Cornelia,  taking  upon  herself  all  the  care  of  the  house- 
hold and  the  education  of  her  children,  approved  her- 
self so  discreet  a  matron,  so  affectionate  a  mother,  and 
so  constant  and  noble-spirited  a  vadow,  that  Tiberius 
Gracchus  seemed  to  all  men  to  have  done  nothing  un- 
reasonable in  choosing  to  die  for  such  a  woman  ;  who, 
when  King  Ptolemy  himself  proffered  her  his  crown, 
and  would  have  married  her,  refused  it  and  chose 
rather  to  live  a  widow.  In  this  state  she  continued, 
and  lost  all  her  children  except  one  daughter,  who 
was  married  to  Scix:)io  Africanus  the  younger,  and  two 
sons,  Tiberius  and  Caius." 

The  eldest  of  these  two  sons  was  named  after  his 
father,  Tiberius  Sempronius  Gracchus.  He  was  born 
about  the  year  166  b.c.  Losing  his  father  when  he  was 
a  little  child,  he  was  brought  up  entirely  by  his 
mother'  Cornelia  and  the  Greek  tutors  whom  she  en- 
gaged to  assist  her.     It  was  an  age  when  every  edu- 


STUDIES   GREEK   LITERATURE.  185 

cated  Roman  deemed  it  essential  to  become  a  good 
Greek  scholar,  Cato  devoted  to  Greek  literature  the 
learned  leisure  of  his  later  years,  and  Cicero  not  only 
delighted  in  the  historians,  i)hilosophers,  poets,  and 
di^amatists  of  Greece,  but  was  himself  an  author  in  the 
Greek  tongue.  Cornelia,  therefore,  a  lady  of  the 
highest  culture  and  refinement,  who  had  in  her  the 
best  patrician  blood  of  Scipio  and  of  Emilius  Paulus, 
would  naturally  be  anxious  that  her  sons  should  be 
masters  of  the  marvellous  language,  which,  as  the 
vehicle  for  subtle  distinctions  and  profound  ideas,  has 
never  been  equalled,  much  less  excelled.  AVe  shall 
find  Cornelia  herself,  long  after  both  her  sons  had  been 
murdered,  enjoying  in  the  calm  retirement  of  the  even- 
ing of  her  life  these  same  Greek  studies  and  conversa- 
tions which  she  provided  for  them  when  boys.  Tibe- 
rius Gracchus  when  a  young  man  married  the  daughter 
of  Appius  Claudius,  chief  of  the  Senate  at  Rome. 
Soon  after  this  he  distinguished  himself  under  his 
brother-in-law,  the  husband  of  his  only  surviving  sister, 
Scipio  Africanus  the  younger,  at  the  siege  of  Carthage, 
when  one  of  the  grandest  cities  of  ancient  commerce 
and  civilization  was  ruthlessly  destroyed,  according  to 
the  military  ethics  of  the  time.  At  about  the  age  of 
thirty,  Tiberius*  Gracchus  served  as  questor  in  Spain. 
He  had,  however,  conceived  the  desire  of  becoming  a 
political  reformer,  and  especially  of  amending  the 
agrarian  laws  by  which  the  tenure  of  property  in  Italy 
was  governed.  Becoming  tribune  of  the  people  in  133 
B.C.,  he  set  himself  to  the  formation  of  a  middle  class 
of  small  landed  proprietors  with  as  much  ardor  as 
many  joatriots  and  reformers  in  our  own  day  have  dis- 


18G  CORNELIA,   THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   GRACCHI. 

jDlayed  in  j)rocuring  a  modification  of  the  Irish  land 
laws  by  giving  the  tenantry  an  interest  in  theu'  hold- 
ings and  advocating  a  peasant  proprietary.  Tiberius 
Gracchus  aimed  at  curtailing  the  immense  powers  and 
incomes  of  the  landlords,  and  as  a  natural  consequence 
provoked  their  combined  hostility.  He  was,  in  pur- 
pose, the  founder  of  an  Italian  land  league,  and  might 
serve  as  the  model  for  Charles  Stewart  Parnell  to  imi- 
tate. His  first  step  was  the  j)roprosal  of  a  measure  re- 
viving in  a  modified  shape  a  long  obsolete  Licinian  law, 
for  the  more  equal  distribution  of  the  public  lands. 
This  measure  was,  of  course,  hailed  with  enthusiasm 
by  the  country  tribes,  who  would  be  directly  benefited 
bj'  it.  But  to  the  same  degree  that  it  delighted  the 
small  holders,  it  enraged  the  wealthy  landlords. 

Cornelia  had  paid  special  attention  to  the  training  of 
both  her  sons  in  oratory.  Both  Tiberius  and  Caius  be- 
came powerful  public  speakers,  the  former,  who  was 
nine  years  the  senior  of  Caius,  being  more  distinguished 
for  convincing  arguments,  keen  satu-e,  and  bitter  irony, 
the  latter  for  impassioned  vehemence,  which  he  found 
it  sometimes  impossible  to  restrain.  We  can  well 
imagine  with  Avhat  telling  and  tremendous  effect  the 
speech  of  Tiberius,  when  he  proposed  his  land  law, 
would  fall  upon  a  Roman  audience.*  "  The  savage 
beasts,"  he  said,  "  in  Italy  have  their  particular  dens, 
they  have  their  places  of  repose  and  refuge  ;  but  the 
men  wlio  bear  arms,  and  expose  their  lives  for  the 
safety  of  their  country,  enjoy  in  the  mean  time  nothing- 
more  in  it  but  the  air  and  light ;  and  liaving  no  houses 
or  settleinents  of  their  own,  are  constrained  to  wander 
from  place  to  place  with  their  wives  and  children." 


CORNELIA,    THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   GRACCHI. 


CONDITION   OF   THE   PEASANTRY.  187 

He  told  tliem  bitterly  tliat  tlie  Roman  commanders 
were  guilty  of  a  ridiculous  error,  when,  at  tlie  head  of 
their  armies,   they   exhorted  the  common  soldiers  to 
fight  for  their  sepulchres  and  altars,  when    not  any 
among  so  many  Romans  is  possessed  of  either  altar  or 
monument,  neither  have  they  any  houses  of  their  o\vn, 
or  hearths  of  their  ancestors  to  defend.     They  fought 
indeed,  and  were  slain,   but  it  was  to  maintain  the 
wealth  and  luxury  of  other  men.     They  were  styled 
the  masters  of  the  world,  but  in  the  mean  time  they  had 
not  one  foot  of  ground  which  they  could  call  their  own. 
Reply  to  a  harangue  of  this  nature,  addressed  to  an 
admiring  and  sympathetic  people,  the  landed  gentry 
felt  it  impossible  to  answer.     They  bided  their  time, 
however,  and  secured  the  services  of  Marcus  Octavius, 
the  other  tribune,  who  had  and  now  exercised  the  right 
of  veto,  and  so  prevented  the  bill  of  Tiberius  Gracchus 
from  becoming  law.     Contentions  arose  henceforth  be- 
tween the  two  tribunes,  Octavius  speaking  always  in 
the  interests  of  the  landlords,  and  Gracchus  of  the  im- 
poverished tenantry. 

This  state  of  things  ill  accords  with  the  enchanting 
pictures  which  the  sweetest  of  Latin  poets,  Yirgil,  has 
left  us  of  Roman  agricultural  and  pastoral  life.  But 
we  must  remember  that  Virgil  wrote  in  the  reign  of 
Augustus,  the  golden  age  not  only  of  Latin  literature 
but  of  Italian  wealth  and  plenty.  But  the  condition 
of  the  agricultural  peasantry  was  anything  but  hope- 
ful, if  we  are  to  believe  the  description  given  by 
Plutarch :  "Of  the  lands  which  the  Romans  gained 
by  conquest  from  their  neighbors,  jDart  they  sold  pub- 
licly,  and  turned  the  remainder    into  common  ;  this 


188  CORNELIA,   THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   GRACCHI. 

common  land  they  assigned  to  such  of  the  citizens  as 
were  poor  and  indigent,  for  wliich  they  were  to  pay 
only  a  small  acknowledgment  into  the  public  treasury. 
But  when  the  wealthy  men  began  to  offer  large  rents, 
and  drive  the  poorer  people  out,  it  was  enacted  by  law 
that  no  person  whatever  should  enjoy  more  than  five 
hundi'ed  acres  of  ground.  This  act  for  some  time 
checked  the  avarice  of  the  rich,  and  was  of  great  as- 
sistance to  the  poorer  people,  who  retained  under  it 
their  respective  i)ortions  of  ground,  as  they  had  been 
formerly  rented  by  them.  Afterward  the  rich  men  of 
the  neighborhood  contrived  to  get  these  lands  again 
into  their  own  possession  under  other  people's  names, 
and  at  last  would  not  scruple  to  claim  most  of  them 
publicly  in  their  own.  The  poor,  who  were  thus  de- 
prived of  their  farms,  were  no  longer  either  ready,  as 
they  had  been  formerly,  to  serve  in  war,  or  careful  in 
the  education  of  their  children  ;  insomuch  that  in  a 
short  time  there  were  comparatively  few  freemen  re- 
maining in  all  Italy,  which  swarmed  with  workhouses 
full  of  foreign-born  slaves.  These  the  rich  men  em- 
ployed in  cultivating  their  ground,  of  which  they  dis- 
possessed the  citizens." 

This  was  the  condition  of  land  tenure  which  Tiberius 
set  himself  to  reform.  It  is  said  that  Cornelia  urged 
him  to  do  so,  but  we  can  scarcely  credit  the  personal 
motive  which  some  writers  have  attributed  to  her,  that 
she  wished  her  son  to  do  something  which  would  shed 
importance  upon  her,  because,  as  she  is  said  to  have 
reproa(;hed  him,  she  was  as  yet  called  by  the  Romans 
the  mother-in-law  of  the  younger  Scipio  Africanus, 
rather  than  the  mother  of  the  Gracchi.     AYhile  referring 


A  FRIEND  OF  THE   OPPRESSED.  189 

to  this  Scipio,  who,  great  as  he  was  in  statesmanshij) 
and  military  glory,  did  not  live  hai)pily  with  his  wife, 
the  daughter  of  Cornelia,  we  may  mention  here  that  a 
calumny  w^hich  was  raised  against  Cornelia  by  the 
enemies  of  the  Gracchi  at  a  subsequent  date  was,  that 
she  caused,  with  the  assistance  of  her  daughter,  the 
death  of  her  son-in-law,  Scipio,  who  w^as  found  dead 
in  his  bed.  There  is  no  evidence  to  show  this,  and  it  is 
contradicted  by  all  that  has  been  handed  down  to  us  of 
her  character  as  well  as  by  that  of  the  age,  which  abhor- 
red private  while  i^ractising  public  assassinations.  We 
may  reasonably  suppose  that  so  intellectual  and  noble 
a  woman  would  take  a  real  interest  in  the  welfare  of 
the  oppressed  peasantry,  and  would  encourage  her  sons, 
from  the  most  generous  motives,  to  become  the  cham- 
X^ions  of  their  rights.  In  our  own  day  we  have  seen  the 
mothers  of  the  Land  Reformers  of  Ireland  do  the  same 
thing,  and  it  is  possible  that  some  of  them  have  taken 
Cornelia  as  theu"  ideal  mother  of  patriots. 

The  result  of  the  advocacy  of  Tiberius  Gracchus, 
however,  was  as  fatal  as  his  motives  were  good.  He 
caused  his  colleague,  Octavius,  to  be  deposed  from  his 
tribuneship,  and  so  put  aside  the  chief  obstacle  to  the 
passage  of  his  bill.  But  both  the  plebeian  or  popular 
party  whom  his  proposed  revival  of  a  dormant  law 
gratified,  and  the  aristocratic  or  landed  class  w^hom  it 
displeased,  were  composed  of  heterogeneous  elements 
not  easy  to  control.  Those  w^ho  as  provincial  governors 
and  military  commanders  had  enriched  themselves  by 
rapacity  and  cruelty  were,  of  course,  adverse  to  any 
measure  in  the  interests  of  the  jioor,  and  were  not  likely 
to  be  scrupulous  in  their  efforts  to  crush  it  and  its  ad- 


190  CORNELIA,    THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   GRACCHI. 

vocates.  Accordingly,  wlien  Gracchus,  losing  his  tem- 
per at  the  opposition  he  encountered,  x>roposed  that  all 
who  held  national  estates  beyond  the  legal  amount 
should  immediately  give  them  up,  and  got  the  law 
passed  by  obtaining  his  legal  authority  as  tribune,  sus- 
pending the  functions  of  other  officers  of  state,  and 
sealing  \\j)  the  doors  of  the  treasury  so  that  no  public 
money  could  be  drawn,  it  began  to  be  whispered  that 
he  aimed  at  making  himself  the  tyrant  of  Rome.  A 
senator  gave  him  warning  that  the  nobility  were  arm- 
ing their  slaves  for  an  attack  upon  him  and  his  sup- 
j)orters.  The  senators,  wrax^ping  their  gowns  around 
their  left  arms,  and  armed  with  clubs  and  sticks, 
marched  in  a  body  to  the  Capitol.  Three  hundred  of 
the  friends  of  Gracchus  were  slain,  and  he  himself,  en- 
deavoring to  escape,  and  stumbling  over  their  bodies, 
was  killed  by  repeated  blows  on  the  head.  The 
Romans  thought  little  of  murder  for  political  ends, 
and  even  Cicero,  who  was  ahead  of  his  time  in  moral 
principle,  warmly  defends  the  murder  of  Tiberius  Sem- 
pronius  Gracchus.  The  Senate  cast  his  body  into  the 
Tiber,  and  proceeded  to  execute  with  great  cruelty  his 
remaining  partisans. 

The  political  career  and  unfortunate  ending  of  Caius, 
the  younger  of  the  Gracchi,  resembled  those  of  his 
brother.  Plutarch,  who,  however,  was  a  foreigner, 
and  wrote  two  hundred  years  after  these  events,  tells 
us  that  he  commenced  his  career  as  tribune  by  making 
inflammatory  speeches  to  the  people  and  bewailing  the 
murder  of  his  brother.  Cicero  relates  that  his  brother 
appeared  to  him  in  a  dream  and  said,  "  Why  do  you 
tarry,  Caius  1    There  is  no  escape  ;  one  life  and  one 


CAIUS  ENCOURAGED   BY   CORNELIA.  191 

death  is  aiDpointed  for  us  both,  to  spend  the  one  and  to 
meet  the  other  in  the  service  of  the  people."     His 
mother,  Cornelia,  also  encouraged  him,  it  is  said,   to 
follow  in  his  brother's  footsteps,   and  carry  out    his 
agrarian  reforms.     So  great  was  the  influence  of  his 
mother  over  Caius  that  he  abandoned  a  measure  he 
had    introduced,    at  her  solicitation.      "This,"    says 
Plutarch,  "was  very  acceptable  and  pleasing  to   the 
people,  w^ho  had  a  great  veneration  for  Cornelia,  not 
more  for  the  sake  of  her  father  than  for  that  of  her 
children."     He  resented  the  least  disrespect  shown  to 
his  mother.     "How  dare  you,"  he  asked  of  another 
speaker,  in  one  of  his  harangues,  ' '  presume  to  reflect 
upon  Cornelia,  the  mother  of  Tiberius  V '     Caius  car- 
ried out  many  excellent  improvements,  especially  in 
the  construction  and  beautifying  of  the  public  roads. 
He    became    highly    popular    with   the    masses.     He 
offended   the   aristocracy,  however,  by    di\T.ding    the 
public  lands  among  the  poorer  citizens,  charging  them 
a  small  annual  rent,  which  he    paid  into  the  public 
treasury.     The     consuls     thwarted     him    in     all    his 
measures,  and  he  resolved,  by  the  advice  of  his  friends, 
to  put  himself  at  the  head  of  a  body  of  retainers,  who 
should  use  force  if    necessary.     Cornelia,   it  is  said, 
aided  him  in  this  by  sending  privately  a  number  of 
strangers  into  Rome,  under  pretence  that  they  came  to 
work  as  harvest  men.     Others  declare  that  Cornelia 
disapproved  of  his  plan  of  resorting  to  violence.     The 
collision  came  at  last.     Accounts  vary  as  to  the  manner 
of  Caius'  death.     Some  say  that  the  slave  who  attended 
him,  in  his  endeavor  to  escape,  killed  him  at  his  re- 
quest ;  others  that  he  slew  his  master  and  then  himself 


192         CORNELIA,  THE  MOTHER   OF   THE  GRACCHI. 

of  his  owTi  volition ;  others  exonerate  his  slave,  Philoc- 
rates,  from  all  participation  in  his  murder.  His  body, 
like  that  of  Tiberius,  is  said  to  have  been  thro^^Ti  into 
the  river,  his  goods  confiscated,  and  his  widow, 
Licinia,  even  forbidden  to  Avear  mourning  and  deprived 
of  her  jointure.  Three  thousand  other  citizens  were 
also  slain. 

It  is  much  to  be  regretted  that  the  epistles  of  Cor- 
nelia, which  Cicero  commends  as  models  of  literary  ex- 
cellence, have  not  been  transmitted  to  us.  That  she  was 
a  woman  of  remarkable  virtue,  culture,  and  heroism, 
there  is  abundant  proof.  She  lived  to  see  the  fickle 
sentiment  of  the  Romans  revering  the  memory  of  her 
sons.  She  herself  always  regarded  them  as  martyrs 
for  the  good  of  the  i^eople  and  in  the  cause  of  Justice 
and  liberty.  The  simple  language  of  Plutarch,  in  his 
life  of  Caius  Gracchus,  describing  her  retirement  at 
Misenum  after  the  death  of  her  sons,  the  younger  of 
whom,  Caius,  was  not  thirty  years  old  when  he  was 
murdered,  cannot  be  paraphrased,  and  may  well  con- 
clude our  sketch  of  Cornelia,  the  mother  of  the  Gracchi. 
"It  is  reiDorted,"  he  says,  "that  as  Cornelia,  then- 
mother,  bore  the  loss  of  her  two  sons  with  a  noble  and 
undaunted  spirit,  so,  in  reference  to  the  holy  places  in 
which  they  were  slain,  she  said  that  their  dead  bodies 
were  well  worthy  of  such  sepulchres.  She  removed 
afterward,  and  dwelt  near  the  place  called  Misenum, 
not  at  all  altering  her  former  way  of  living.  She  had 
many  friends,  and  hospitably  received  many  strangers 
at  her  house  ;  many  Greeks  and  learned  men  were  con- 
tinually about  her ;  nor  was  there  any  foreign  prince 
but  received  gifts  from  her  and  presented  gifts  to  her 


NOBLE    BEARING   OF   CORNELIA.  193 

again.  Those  who  were  conversant  with  her  were  much 
interested  when  she  pleased  to  entertain  them  with  her 
recollections  of  her  father,  Scipio  Africanns,  and  of  his 
habits  and  way  of  living.  But  it  was  most  admirable 
to  hear  her  make  mention  of  her  sons,  without  any 
tears  or  sign  of  grief,  and  give  the  full  account  of  all 
their  deeds  and  misfortunes,  as  if  she  had  been  relating 
the  history  of  some  ancient  heroes.  This  made  some 
imagine  that  age  or  the  greatness  of  her  alflictions  had 
made  her  senseless  and  devoid  of  natural  feelings. 
But  they  who  so  thought  were  themselves  more  truly 
insensible,  not  to  see  how  much  a  noble  nature  and 
education  avail  to  conquer  any  affliction  ;  and  though 
fortune  may  often  be  more  successful,  and  may  defeat 
the  efforts  of  virtue  to  avert  misfortunes,  it  cannot, 
when  we  incur  them,  i^revent  our  bearing  them  reason- 
ably." 


LORD  BYRON'S  MOTHER. 

It  very  rarely  happens  that  the  sanity  of  both  the 
parents  of  a  great  man  has  been  doubted.  Usually  if 
the  father  has  been  irrational  in  his  actions,  the  mother 
has  atoned  for  it  by  patience  and  prudence.  If  the 
temper  of  one  parent  has  been  headstrong  and  impa- 
tient of  contradiction,  that  of  the  other  has  been  long- 
suffering  and  conciliatory.  The  parents  of  many  great 
men  neutralize  if  they  do  not  equalize  each  other.  If 
the  one  is  an  acid,  the  other  is  an  alkali  ;  if  the  one  is 
passionate,  the  other  is  forbearing. 

Never  perhaps  in  literary  history  has  a  great  genius 
been  so  unfortunate  in  both  of  his  parents  as  was 
George  Gordon  Byron.  It  is  not  only  necessary  to 
take  a  searching  look  at  both  of  them  in  order  to  un- 
derstand the  wayward  and  ungovernable  character  of 
their  son,  but  it  is  necessary  to  glance  at  the  idiosyn- 
crasies both  of  the  father  and  the  son  in  order  to  under- 
stand the  character  of  the  mother. 

Let  us  begin  therefore  with  a  brief  account  of  "Mad 
Jack  Byron,"  as  Captain  Byron,  the  father  of  the 
poet,  was  called  by  his  associates.  He  was  the  son  of 
Admiral  John  Byron,  nicknamed  "  Foul- weather 
Jack"  in  the  navy,  who  married  Sophia,  his  first  cousin, 
daughter  of  John  Trevanion,  of  Cornwall,  and  Barbara, 
sister  of  Frances  Berkeley,  who  married  William,  tlie 
fourth  Lord  Bja-on.     These  sisters  were  the  daughters 


THE   BYRON   FAMILY.  195 

of  Baron  Berkeley,  of  Stratton.  These  Berkeleys  were 
noted  for  impulsiveness  and  waywardness.  New 
cliaracteristics  of  this  kind  were  for  the  first  time  ob- 
servable in  the  offsj^ring  of  the  fourth  Lord  Byron  and 
Frances  Berkeley,  and  when  her  sister  s  daughter  mar- 
ried their  son,  afterward  the  Admiral,  the  Berkeley 
blood,  being  equal  in  each  of  them,  was  transmitted  in 
double  power  to  "Mad  Jack  Byron"  of  the  Guards, 
the  poet' s  father  and  the  husband  of  Catharine  Gor- 
don, his  mother. 

Admiral  Byron  died  on  the  10th  of  April,  1786,  in 
his  63d  year,  leaving  two  sons — the  poet' s  father  and 
George  Anson  Byron,  who  distinguished  himself  in  the 
navy,  and  was  the  father  of  the  poet' s  successor  in  the 
barony — and  three  daughters,  one  of  whom  married 
General  Leigh,  and  another,  by  her  marriage  with  the 
only  son  of  the  fifth  Lord  Byron,  became  the  mother 
of  the  heir-apparent  to  the  barony,  through  whose  un- 
timely death  at  Corsica,  in  1794,  the  poet  succeeded  to 
the  peerage. 

His  great-uncle,  "the  wicked  lord,"  as  he  was  called, 
seemed  to  have  more  than  his  share  of  the  Byron- 
Berkeley  vices.  He  cared  nothing  for  family  relation- 
ship, took  no  notice  of  "the  little  boy  in  Aberdeen" 
who  was  to  succeed  him,  and  impoverished  the  estate 
by  illegal  sales  of  property.  ' '  Mad  Jack  Byron' '  has 
been  represented  by  some  as  gross  and  brutal  in  his 
manners,  but  as  his  son  said  in  a  letter,  long  after  his 
death,  "  It  is  not  by  '  brutality '  that  a  young  officer  of 
the  Guards  seduces  and  marries  a  marcliioness,  and 
marries  two  heiresses."  From  him  Lord  Byron  do 
rives  his  remarkable  beauty  of  features.     His  conduct 


196  LORD  BYRON'S  MOTHER. 

shows  him  to  have  been  an  unprincipled  libertine, 
good-natured  to  himself,  and  careless  of  the  wrongs  he 
inflicted  upon  others.  When  he  succeeded  in  ruining 
the  Marchioness  Carmarthen,  wife  of  the  heir  to  the 
dukedom  of  Leeds,  she  was  not  yet  twenty-three, 
though  the  mother  of  three  children,  and  he  not 
twenty- one.  She  possessed  remarkable  beauty,  and 
became  Baroness  Conyers  in  her  own  right  on  the  death 
of  her  father,  the  fourth  Earl  of  Holderness.  In  1778, 
when  he  was  twenty-two  and  her  first  husband  had 
divorced  her,  the  noble  Guardsman  married  her  and 
they  went  to  France.  It  is  not  likely  that  he  ill-treated 
her,  since  her  life  income  was  £4000  a  year,  and  her 
death,  which  took  place  six  years  afterward,  left ' '  Mad 
Jack"  without  a  penny.  Augusta  Byron,  afterward 
the  Honorable  Mrs.  Leigh,  and  the  poet's  half-sister, 
was  the  only, child  of  this  marriage.  It  is  unnecessary 
to  refute  the  atrocious  charge  which  was  made  against 
Lord  Byron's  memory  in  connection  with  this  lialf- 
sister,  for  whom  he  entertained  a  brother' s  friendship, 
and  life-long  affection. 

The  adventurous  Life  Guardsman,  now  a  widower, 
soon  began  to  cast  his  eyes  around  for  an  heiress  to 
recuperate  his  fortunes.  At  Bath,  then  the  fashion- 
able Avatering-place,  he  met  Catharine  Gordon,  of 
Gight,  Aberdeenshire,  who  had  £23,000  in  land,  bank 
shares,  and  monej^  Perhaps  he  thought  she  had 
more,  or  that  the  amount  would  suffice  for  his  pleas- 
ures. He  engaged  her  affections  easily,  for  in  spite 
of  her  fortune,  her  unattractive  looks  and  awkward 
figure  had  kept  her  without  offers  of  marriage.  They 
were  married  in  Scotland,  in  March,  1786,  not  at  Bath, 


A   VAGABOND   HUSBAND.  197 

as  Moore  states  in  his  "Life  of  Byron."  Her  father 
had  committed  suicide,  and  as  she  was  of  age  she  was 
mistress  of  her  own  actions  as  well  as  of  her  fortune. 
Early  in  the  following  summer  he  took  her  to  France, 
and  at  Paris — his  favorite  abode — and  Chantilly,  where 
he  chiefly  kept  his  wife,  they  soon  got  through  £3000, 
which  was  her  stock  of  ready  money  when  they  mar- 
ried, and  £600  which  she  obtained  by  the  sale  of  her 
two  shares  in  the  Aberdeen  Banking  Company. 

For  two  years  after  their  marriage  they  were  living 
in  London.  Mrs.  Byron  was  now  frequently  without 
funds  to  meet  necessary  household  expenses,  and  she 
found  that  when  her  husband' s  creditors  were  arranged 
with  she  would  have  only  a  pittance  of  £150  a  year 
to  suj^port  the  vagabond  husband — who,  as  she  now 
discovered,  had  only  married  her  for  her  money — her 
young  babe,  the  future  Lord  Byron,  and  Augusta,  the 
daughter  of  her  husband  by  his  first  wife. 

Here  surely  were  circumstances  sufiiciently  distress- 
ing to  sour  the  milk  of  human  kindness  even  in  a  natu- 
rally amiable  woman.  Acting  upon  a  temper  naturally 
jassionate  and  irritable,  a  heart  that  had  been  cruelly 
deceived,  an  heiress  who  had  been  swindled  out  of  her 
fortune  by  an  unprincipled  and  dissipated  husband,  a 
tongue  that  had  never  been  taught  restraint  by  educa- 
tion and  self-control,  they  were  enough  to  drive  her 
half  mad,  as  her  father  probably  was  before  her  when 
he  took  his  own  life.  If  the  poet  pleads  for  pity  and 
sympathy  on  account  of  inherited  humors,  so  also  does 
his  mother.  It  is  impossible  for  us,  as  it  proved  for 
him,  to  feel  affection  or  respect  for  her,  but  she  was 
not  altogether  the  fury  of  which  her  fits  of  uncontrol  - 


198  LORD  BYRON'S  MOTHER. 

lable  passion  would  lead  us  to  imagine.  There  are 
some  touches  of  humanity  and  motherhood  in  her 
actions,  when  the  trials  and  vicissitudes  which  "  Mad 
Jack  Byron"  had  brought  upon  her  are  calmly  re- 
viewed. And  as  his  conduct  to  her  palliates  hers  to 
her  son,  so  does  the  latter  form  a  mournful  apology 
for  that  son's  wasted  and  unhappy  life. 

It  would  need  the  pen  of  as  keen  a  satirist  as  Thack- 
eray to  do  justice  to  the  ignominious  condition  of  the 
dashing  Guardsman,  when,  having  squandered  his 
wife's  fortune,  and  brought  her  and  his  two  children  to 
penury,  he  writes  a  begging  letter  asking  her  piteous- 
ly  for  a  guinea  !  Yet  to  such  a  pass  as  this  did  Cap- 
tain Byron  sink,  a  character  as  contemptible  and  with 
far  less  excuse  than  that  other  retired  military  man 
whom  Thackeray  did  draw  to  the  life,  the  gray-blos- 
somed Captain  Costigan. 

His  sister,  Mrs.  Leigh,  helped  "Mad  Jack"  contin- 
ually out  of  her  own  pin-money,  but  his  wife,  with  noth- 
ing to  support  herself,  the  future  lord,  and  his  half-sis- 
ter, except  the  interest  of  £3000  in  the  hands  of  trustees, 
was  often  compelled  to  refuse  him  the  money  he  asked 
for  his  selfish  pleasures.  A  servant  had  to  be  kept,  and 
while  the  duped  wife  was  trying  her  utmost  to  econ- 
omize, the  captain  insisted  that  "supplies  would  soon 
be  coming  to  him  from  his  kindred  in  the  South  and 
his  old  friends  in  France  ;  and  in  the  mean  time  wine 
and  meat  must  be  bought  for  him  on  credit."  Of 
course  his  unprincipled  demands  upon  the  wife  he 
had  brought  from  affluence  to  poverty  led  to  sharp 
recriminations.  What  right  had  he,  an  adventurer 
who  had  lived  upon  his  dupes,    of  whom  Catharine 


AN    UNHAPPY    COUPLE.  199 

Gordon  was  the  most  unfortunate,  to  complain  of  tlie 
oatmeal  and  haggis  she  set  before  him  '.  Plain  leg  of 
mutton  was  more  than  he  deserved,  and  when  he  asked 
for  expensive  wines  and  delicacies,  to  be  obtained  on 
credit,  she  flatly  refused.  The  proofs  of  her  excitable 
and  ungoverned  temper  are  so  strong  that  we  may  be 
sure  she  made  things  lively  for  the  gallant  captain 
on  these  occasions.  It  is  said  that  she  scolded  him 
from  morning  till  night,  and  that  to  escape  this  Just 
punishment  of  his  misdeeds,  he  took  a  separate  room 
at  the  other  end  of  the  street.  This  was  after  they 
had  left  London  and  gone  to  live  at  Aberdeen.  Yet, 
strangely  enough,  Mrs.  Byron  wept  for  him  in  his 
absence,  although  she  rated  him  whenever  he  ap- 
peared. 

It  was  upon  one  of  these  appearances  when,  finding 
the  ennui  of  Scottish  life  insupportable,  the  captain  re- 
solved to  return  to  France,  if  he  could  get  the  means 
of  doing  so,  that  Mrs.  Byron  told  him  that  she  had 
not  a  penny  in  her  pocket,  but  that  even  if  she  had 
fifty  guineas  in  her  hand  she  would  not  give  him  one 
of  them.  He  was  actually  mean  enough  to  write  her  a 
begging  letter  for  a  single  guinea,  and  his  son,  who  al- 
ways cherished  feelings  of  afi'ection  for  his  father,  pre- 
served the  letter,  with  cynical  rather  than  filial  venera- 
tion. Perhaps  one  reason  why  Lord  Byron  loved  his 
father  was  that  the  latter  used  to  lie  in  wait  for  the  little 
lame  boy  and  his  nurse  when  the  latter  was  taking 
him  for  a  walk.  He  would  play  with  little  George  and 
pet  him.  Such  early  notice  often  makes  an  indelible 
impression  on  the  hearts  and  memories  of  children,  and 
Lord   Byron   said,  in  his  latter  years,   "  I  was  not  so 


200  LORD   BYRON'S    MOTHER. 

young  when  my  father  died  but  that  I  perfectly  re- 
member him." 

He  cannot  have  been  more  than  three  years  old  when 
he  saw  his  father  for  the  last  time.  It  became  neces- 
sary for  Captain  Byron  to  withdraw  from  Scotland  and 
from  British  soil,  and  to  save  him  from  arrest  by  his 
creditors,  his  wife  and  sister,  Mrs.  Leigh,  provided  him 
with  the  means  of  escaping  to  France.  This  was  at 
the  commencement  of  1791,  and  he  died  at  Valenciennes 
a  few  months  later,  in  his  thirty-sixth  year. 

The  late  Rev.  William  Harness,  the  well-known  liter- 
ary clergyman  of  London,  is  authority  for  the  state- 
ment that  Lord  Byron,  with  whom  he  was  on  very  inti- 
mate terms,  said  to  him  on  more  than  one  occasion  that 
"his  father  was  insane,  and  had  killed  himself."  Tlie 
clergyman,  on  investigation,  came  to  the  unnatural 
conclusion  that  the  poet  had  told  him  what  he  knew  to 
be  untrue,  and  that  it  was  one  of  the  freaks  of  his  mor- 
bid humor  thus  to  "calumniate  the  blood  flowing  in 
his  veins."  But  this  is  an  unnecessary  interpretation. 
Lord  Byron  may  have  had  reasons  for  believing  that 
his  father  committed  suicide,  as  his  mother's  father  had 
done.  The  manner  of  ' '  Mad  Jack  ' '  Byron' s  life  had 
been  so  eccentric  that  there  is  no  improbability  in  sup- 
posing that  when  he  had  squandered  his  last  guinea  in 
France  he  assisted  at  his  own  "taking  off."  To  many 
it  might  seem  about  the  best  thing  he  could  do,  dis- 
graced in  his  profession  by  debt  and  dissipation,  im- 
moralities and  venal  marriages,  an  exile  from  his  own 
country,  and  without  the  ability  or  industry  to  earn  a 
living  in  any  other. 

There  was  one,  however,  who  mourned  his  death  with 


CAPTAIN   BYRON.  201 

sincere  affection.  It  was  the  hot-tempered  wife,  whom 
he  had  given  such  just  cause  to  hate  him  and  curse  the 
hour  when  he  first  pretended  love  for  lier  in  order  to 
gain  possession  of  her  fortune.  On  receiving  the  in- 
telligence of  his  death,  the  poor  woman's  screams 
alarmed  the  neighborhood.  Her  grief  was  as  uncon- 
trollable as  her  temper.  Their  little  son  perhaps  won- 
dered even  in  his  precocious  infancy  of  three  years  old, 
that  his  mother  should  grieve  so  inconsolably  for  his 
father,  whom  she  had  quarrelled  with  so  often  in  his 
presence. 

It  must  be  remembered,  as  some  palliation  of  Captain 
Byron's  conduct,  that  the  greater  part  of  his  early  edu- 
cation had  been  received  in  France,  a  country  so  lax 
in  morals  at  that  time  that  his  youthful  debaucheries 
were  not  likely  to  be  checked  or  disapproved.  The 
Byrons  had  French  connections,  and  Marshal  Byron 
hailed  "Mad  Jack"  as  a  cousin.  Paris  was  the  para- 
dise of  cities  to  him,  and  life  in  Scotland,  especially  with 
an  ill-tempered  wife,  seemed  not  worth  living  to  him. 
In  Paris  his  elegance,  gallantry,  handsome  face  and 
figure,  and  lax  moral  principles  were  admired  by  women 
and  men  alike.  No  doubt  he  contrasted  painfully  the 
beauty  of  his  first  wife  with  the  homeliness  of  his  sec- 
ond, and  looked  back  mournfully  at  the  bygone  days 
when  Lady  Conger' s  life  income  of  £4000  a  year  had 
been  his  own.  The  scolding  and  unattractive  daughter 
of  a  Scotch  laird  was  a  poor  substitute  for  the  beauti- 
ful peeress,  and  whatever  desirability  had  attracted  to 
Catharine  Gordon  vanished  when  out  of  her  £23,000  he 
had  left  her  but  £3000,  which  her  trustees  luckily  kept 
from  him. 


202  LORD  BYRON'S  MOTHER. 

According  to  the  descriptions  left  us  of  her  person 
and  manners,  Lord  Byron's  mother  must  have  been 
singularly  wanting  in  the  ordinary  agreeableness  of 
women.  "  Though  she  had  royal  blood  in  her  veins,'' 
says  Mr.  Jeaffreson,  ' '  and  belonged  to  the  superior 
branch  of  the  Gordons,  it  would  not  have  been  easy  to 
find  a  gentlewoman  whose  person  and  countenance 
were  less  indicative  of  ancestral  purity.  A  dumpy 
young  woman,  with  a  large  waist,  florid  complexion, 
and  homely  features,  she  would  have  been  mistaken 
anywhere  for  a  small  farmer's  daughter  or  a  petty 
tradesman's  wife,  had  it  not  been  for  her  silks  and 
feathers,  the  rings  on  her  fingers,  and  the  jewelry  about 
her  short,  thick  neck.  At  this  early  time  of  her  career 
she  was  not  quite  so  graceless  and  awkward  as  Mrs. 
Cardurcis  (in  Lord  Beaconsfield's  Venetia),  but  it  was 
already  manifest  that  she  would  be  cumbrously  corpu- 
lent on  coming  to  middle  age  ;  and  even  in  her  twenty- 
fifth  year  she  walked  in  a  way  that  showed  how  ab- 
surdly she  would  waddle  through  drawing-rooms  and 
gardens  on  the  development  of  her  unwieldy  person. 
In  the  last  century  it  was  not  uncommon  for  matrons  of 
ancient  lineage  to  possess  little  learning  and  no  accom- 
plishments ;  but  Miss  Gordon's  education  was  very 
much  inferior  to  the  education  usually  accorded  to  the 
young  gentlewomen  of  her  period.  Unable  to  speak 
any  other  language,  she  spoke  her  mother  tongue  with 
a  broad  Scotch  brogue,  and  wrote  it  in  a  style  that  in 
this  politer  age  would  be  discreditable  to  a  waiting- 
woman.  Though  she  was  a  writer  of  long  espistles, 
they  seldom  contained  a  capital  letter  or  a  mark  of 
punctuation   to  assist    the   reader  in   the   sometimes 


A   KIND   STEPMOTHER.  20a 

arduous  task  of  discovering  their  precise  meaning,  and 
though  she  could  spell  the  more  simple  words  correctly, 
when  she  was  writing  in  a  state  of  mental  placidity, 
she  never  used  her  pen  in  moments  of  excitement  with- 
out committing  comical  blunders  of  orthography.  To 
Captain  Byron,  however,  the  lady' s  temper  was  more 
grievous  than  her  defects  of  person,  breeding,  and  cult- 
ure. It  should,  however,  be  remembered  by  readers 
who  would  do  her  justice,  that  Mrs.  Byron  was  by  no 
means  devoid  of  the  shrewdness  and  ordinary  intelli- 
gence of  inferior  womankind,  and  was  capable  of  gen- 
erous impulses  to  the  persons  whom,  in  her  frequent 
fits  of  uncontrollable  fury,  she  would  assail  with  un- 
feminine  violence,  and  even  with  unnatural  cruelty." 

An  illustration  of  this  brighter  side  of  her  character 
may  be  found  in  the  care  she  took  of  Augusta,  her 
husband' s  daughter  by  his  first  wife.  It  is  true  that 
she  accepted  the  offer  of  the  Dowager  Countess  of  Hold- 
erness,  the  child' s  maternal  grandmother,  to  adopt  her, 
but  she  treated  her  with  affection  and  parted  from  her 
with  unaffected  regret.  Little  Augusta  had  been  her 
sole  companion  at  Chantilly  on  those  prolonged  ab- 
sences of  Captain  Byron  when  he  was  dissipating  in 
Paris.  She  had  nursed  Augusta  with  motherly  solici- 
tude during  an  illness  in  France  that  nearly  proved 
fatal.  The  child  never  forgot  this  kindness  of  her  step- 
mother, and  when  they  met,  after  an  interval  of  thirteen 
years,  the  girl  manifested  her  gratitude  and  affection. 
This  is  the  half-sister  whose  name  has  been  immortal- 
ized by  the  poet's  song. 

One  would  gladly  pass  over,  if  it  were  possible,  the 
cmelest  and  most  unnatural  episode  that  seems  ever 


204  LORD   BYRON'S  MOTHER. 

to  have  occurred  between  Mrs.  Byron  and  her  son. 
After  swearing  at  him  on  one  occasion  and  loading 
him  with  abusive  epithets,  this  momentarily  demoni- 
acal mother  taunted  her  own  boy  with  being  ' '  a  lame 
brat"  !  Yet,  according  to  Lord  Byron's  own  words, 
when  many  years  afterward  he  told  the  Marquis  of 
Sligo  the  reasons  that  made  it  impossible  for  him  to 
feel  as  a  son  should  toward  a  widowed  mother,  she 
herself  was  to  blame  for  his  deformity.  "  Look 
there!"  he  said,  "it  is  to  her  false  delicacy  at  my 
birth  I  owe  that  deformity  ;  and  yet  as  long  as  I  can 
remember  she  has  never  ceased  to  taunt  and  reproach 
me  with  it.  Even  a  few  days  before  we  parted  for  the 
last  time,  on  my  leaving  England,  she,  in  one  of  her 
fits  of  passion,  uttered  an  imprecation  upon  me,  pray- 
ing that  I  might  prove  as  ill-formed  in  mind  as  I  was 
in  body."  "His  look,"  says  Tom  Moore,  his  friend 
and  biographer,  "  in  relating  this  frightful  circum- 
stance can  be  conceived  only  by  those  who  have  seen 
him  in  a  similar  state  of  excitement."  On  the  occa- 
sion previously  referred  to,  when  his  mother  called 
him  "a  lame  brat,"  another  biographer  records  that 
' '  at  this  unnatural  gibe  a  fearful  light  came  from  the 
child's  eyes,  the  light  that  so  often  flashed  from  them . 
in  the  coming  time.  The  boy's  visible  emotion  was 
not  lost  upon  the  mother,  who  probably  expected  it  to 
be  followed  by  words  no  less  violent  than  her  own. 
But  tlie  child  surpassed  the  mother  in  self-control. 
For  half  a  minute,  while  his  lips  quivered  and  his  face 
whitened  from  the  force  of  feeling  never  to  be  forgot- 
ten, he  was  silent ;  and  then  he  spoke  five  short 
words,  and  no  more.     '  I  was  born  so,  mother  ! '    he 


BYRON   AT    SCHOOL.  205 

said,  slowly,  before  he  turned  away  from  the  woman 
who  dared  not  follow  him."  That  poor  Byron  never 
forgot  this  terrible  scene  is  clear  from  the  dialogue  in 
"The  Deformed  Transformed,"  written  at  Pisa  three 
years  before  his  death  : 

'■'■Bertha.     Out,  hunchback  ! 
Arnold.     I  was  born  so,  mother." 

The  dissipated  character  of  her  husband,  and  the 
deep  injury  he  had  done  her  by  marrying  her  for  her 
money  without  the  least  spark  of  sincerity  in  the  love 
he  offered  her,  and  the  utter  selfishness  and  sangfroid 
with  which  he  appropriated  her  fortune,  might  lead 
one  to  distrust  the  truth  of  his  complaints  about  her 
temper.  Unfortunately  there  is  too  much  concurrent 
testimony  to  the  same  effect  to  make  doubt  possible. 
Even  if  her  son  could  be  supposed  to  exaggerate  or 
misrepresent  his  mother' s  violence,  there  is  abundant 
independent  testimony  that  she  was  a  woman  whom  it 
was  scarcely  possible  to  get  along  with.  The  Earl  of 
Carlisle,  who  was  the  nephew  of  the  "wicked  lord," 
who  preceded  Lord  Byron  at  Newstead,  and  was 
therefore  his  cousin,  was  appointed  his  guardian. 
But  for  his  mother  the  boy  might  have  got  along  well 
enough  with  this  trustee  of  his  minority,  but  Mrs. 
Byron  so  perpetually  thwarted  and  interfered  with 
his  directions  that  at  last  the  guardian  refused  to 
have  anything  more  to  do  with  her,  Byron  was 
now  twelve  years  old  and  was  at  the  school  of  Dr. 
Glennie  in  Dulwich  Grove.  Dr.  Glennie  was  a  Scotch- 
man with  more  than  the  common  stock  of  pedagogue 
attainments,   and    amiable  withal,    but   Lord    Byron 


206  LORD   BYRON'S   MOTHER. 

never  mentions  him  or  liis  scliool,  where  he  stayed  two 
years,  in  his  journal  or  letters.  Eighteen  years  later, 
in  1817,  Dr.  Glennie  had  the  courage  to  express  his 
disbelief  in  the  stories  that  were  circulated  to  Lord 
Byron's  discredit.  There  was,  therefore,  no  ill-will 
"between  them,  and  Lord  Byron's  silence  about  his 
Dulwich  days  was  probably  caused  by  the  remem- 
brance of  collisions  between  his  mother  and  his  school- 
master, in  which  he,  of  course,  became  involved.  One 
habit  which  Mrs  Byron  had  was  that  of  utterly  disre- 
garding the  authority  of  the  master  and  the  discipline 
of  the  school  by  fetching  her  boy  wherever  she  pleased, 
and  keeping  him  away  as  long  as  it  suited  her,  some- 
times from  Friday  until  Monday,  at  other  times  for  a 
whole  week.  "Mrs.  Byron,"  wrote  Dr.  Grlennie  to 
Tom  Moore,  while  speaking  most  kindly  of  her  son, 
"was  a  total  stranger  to  English  society  and  English 
manners,  with  an  exterior  far  from  prepossessing, 
an  understanding  where  nature  had  not  been  more 
bountiful,  a  mind  wholly  without  cultivation,  and 
the  peculiarities  of  northern  opinions,  northern  habits, 
and  northern  accent.  I  trust  I  do  no  prejudice  to  the 
memory  of  my  countrywoman,  if  I  say  Mrs.  Byron 
was  not  a  Madame  de  Lambert,  endowed  with  powers 
to  retrieve  the  fortune  and  form  the  character  and 
manners  of  a  young  nobleman,  her  son."  Both  the 
mother  and  th^  teacher  seem  to  have  appealed  to 
Lord  Carlisle,  who  decided  that  Lord  Byron  should 
pay  a  weekly  visit  to  his  mother  from  Saturday  to 
Monday,  on  condition  that  he  return  in  time  for  the 
studies  of  that.  day.  But  the  temper  that  could 
not  brook  the  mild  expostulations  of  Dr.  Glennie  and 


CATHARINE   GORDON'S    TEMPER.  207 

his  wife  was  not  likely  to  bow  to  the  authority  of  a 
guardian,  even  though  that  guardian  was  an  earl. 
"Of  Lord  Carlisle's  last  interview  with  Mrs.  Byron 
nothing  is  known,  save  that  he  left  her  presence  with 
.  a  determination  to  see  as  little  as  possible  of  her  in 
the  future.  Confessing  himself  beaten  by  the  virago, 
with  whom  he  never  again  condescended  to  bandy 
words,  the  earl  said  to  Dr.  Glennie,  '  I  can  have  noth- 
ing more  to  do  with  Mrs.  Byron.  You  must  now 
manage  her  as  best  you  can.'  "  While  at  this  school 
one  of  the  boys  said  to  the  future  poet : 

"Byron,  your  mother  is  a  fool  !"  "  I  know  it!" 
was  the  answer. 

It  seems  likely  that  the  Byron  family  were  so  well 
acquainted  with  Catharine  Gordon's  temper*  and  ill- 
breeding  that  they  kept  aloof  from  her  as  much  as 
possible,  even  on  paper.  Although  Captain  Byron's 
sister,  Mrs.  Leigh,  had  frequently  assisted  them  during 
his  lifetime  and  had  expressed  her  sympathy  with  his 
widow,  she  gradually  ceased  from  writing  to  her,  and 
when  Lord  Byron  came  into  the  succession  to  the 
peerage  and  estates  by  the  death  of  the  next  heir 
above  him  at  Corsica,  Mrs.  Byron  was  the  last  person 
to  hear  of  her  boy' s  good  fortune.  When  the  intelli- 
gence reached  her  it  came  in  a  manner  that  declared 
to  all  Aberdeen  how  little  she  was  esteemed  by  her 
husband' s  people.  For  the  news,  which  should  have 
been  sent  promptly  from  IS'ewstead,  she  was  indebted 
to  the  gossip  of  a  neighbor.  If  she  received  the  as- 
tounding intelligence  at  a  tea-party  it  is  not  difficult  to 
imagine  the  resentment  and  humiliation  that  qualified 
her  delight  when  an  eager  demand  for  her  informant's 


208  LORD  BYRON'S  MOTHER. 

authority  for  the  staggering  announcement  provoked 
expressions  of  lively  astonishment  at  her  ignorance  of 
a  matter  that  had  been  known  for  more  than  a  month 
to  every  one  else. 

Of  course,  her  neighbors  and  the  Byron  kindred 
now  began  to  look  more  kindly  upon  the  mother  of  the 
embryo  peer  and  heir  to  the  barony.  Five  years  later, 
when  her  son  became  Lord  Byron  on  the  death  of  his 
great-uncle,  who  died  on  the  19th  of  May,  1798, 
Catharine  Gordon  Byron  obtained  the  pension  she  had 
long  tried  for  of  £300  a  year  on  the  Civil  List. 

While  Lord  Byron  was  at  Harrow  and  Cambridge, 
his  mother  resided  at  Southwell,  at  Burgage  Manor. 
There,  although  he  was  no  longer  a  mere  boy,  she  re- 
newed hostilities  with  him  whenever  he  came  to  spend 
a  vacation  with  her.  Some  of  the  incidents  narrated 
of  their  quarrels  would  be  simply  ludicrous  if  it  were 
not  shocking  to  contemplate  such  relations  between  a 
mother  and  son.  Perhaps  he  provoked  her  with 
coldness  or  cynicism,  but  in  the  strife  of  tongues  he 
seems  to  have  had  more  decency  and  self-control  than 
his  mother.  Even  if  the  principals  had  kept  their  own 
counsels,  the  servants  of  the  house  of  course  carried 
the  news  of  each  battle  from  kitchen  to  kitchen.  But 
Mrs.  Byron  herself  would  go  forth  crying,  after  each 
engagement,  to  tell  the  neighbors  what  a  wretched,  ill- 
used  mother  she  was,  while  Byron,  as  he  did  all 
his  life,  made  every  one  he  met  the  confidant  of  his 
domestic  grievances.  His  mother's  father  he  knew 
had  committed  suicide,  and  he  believed  that  his  own 
father  had  done  the  same.  It  was  not  unnatural,  there- 
fore, for  him  to  feel  some  apprehension  lest  his  mother, 


A   FIGHT   BETWEEN   MOTPIER    AND   SON.  209 

after  one  of  her  paroxysms  of  temper,  should  attempt 
to  take  her  own  life.  But  it  was  odd  that  she  should 
feel  the  same  fear  on  his  account.  An  apothecary  in 
Southwell,  says  a  well-authenticated  story,  received 
early  intelligence  of  a  more  than  usually  desperate 
quarrel  between  Lord  Byron  and  his  mother  from  the 
young  lord  himself,  who  entered  his  shop  one  night 
hurriedly  and  begged  him  on  no  account  to  sell  Mrs. 
Byron  any  drug  that  could  prove  fatal.  The  son  had 
not  been  long  gone  before  the  mother  paid  the  man  of 
pestle  and  mortar  a  visit  to  give  him  a  similar  caution 
in  reference  to  her  son. 

Soon  after  this  absurd  incident,  their  neighbors,  the 
Pigotts  were  sitting  up  late  one  evening  in  their  draw- 
ing-room, when  Lord  Byron  paid  them  an  unexpected 
visit  to  beg  they  would  give  him  a  bed  for  the  night, 
as  he  had  resolved  to  be  off  to  London  in  the  morning 
without  bidding  his  mother  good-by  and  never  to  see 
her  again  until  she  had  begged  his  pardon  for  her 
violence.  It  seems  that  on  this  occasion  Mrs.  Byron, 
who  had  already  made  her  son  familiar  with  the  tongs 
as  weapons  of  war,  had  attacked  him  with  the  poker. 

Lord  Byron  took  up  his  abode  at  Newstead  Abbey 
in  September,  1808,  when  he  was  four  months  under 
age,  and  spent  much  of  his  time  there  as  a  luxurious 
bachelor  until  the  June  of  the  next  year,  when  he 
started  for  Greece.  He  would  not  allow  his  mother  to 
live  there  until  he  had  left,  and  it  was  after  his  return 
and  while  in  London  at  a  hotel  that  the  tidings  reached 
him  from  Newstead  that  his  mother  was  seriously  ill, 
and  next  morning  that  she  was  dead.  This  was  on 
August  1st,  181 1.     On  the  morrow  he  set  out  for  'New- 


210  LORD  BYRON'S  MOTHER. 

stead  and  wrote  to  his  friend  Pigott  on  the  road  :  "  I 
am  told  she  was  in  little  pain,  and  not  unaware  of  her 
situation.  I  now  feel  the  truth  of  Mr.  Gray' s  observa- 
tion, '  That  we  can  only  have  one  mother  ! '  Peace  be 
with  her." 

"The  right  feeling  of  these  words  is  moderately  ex- 
pressed," says  Mr.  J.  C.  Jeaffreson,  the  author  of 
"  The  Real  Lord  Byron,"  an  excellent  life  of  and  apol- 
ogy for  him,  ' '  but  there  was  no  moderation  in  the  grief 
to  which  Byron  gave  way  at  Newstead  for  a  brief  hour, 
after  hearing  the  particulars  of  his  mother's  death, 
which  was  the  result  of  apoplexy,  caused  by  a  fit  of 
violent  rage  at  the  magnitude  of  an  upholsterer' s  bill. 
In  the  middle  of  the  night,  hearing  a  noise  in  the 
chamber  of  death,  Mrs.  By,  the  waitihg-woman  of  the 
deceased  lady,  entered  the  apartment,  where  she 
found  Lord  Byron  sitting  by  the  side  of  his  lifeless 
mother.  '  O  Mrs.  By,'  he  exclaimed,  bursting  into 
tears,  '  I  had  but  one  friend  in  the  world,  and  she  is 
gone.'  To  account  for  the  vehemence  of  this  grief  for 
a  mother  whom  he  had  regarded  with  an  aversion  at 
the  same  time  natural  and  most  unnatural — the  mother 
of  whose  cruelty  he  had  spoken  with  passionate  re- 
pugnance to  the  Marquis  of  Sligo,  as  they  were  dress- 
ing after  swimming  in  the  Gulf  of  Lepanto,  .  .  . 
we  must  remember  the  way  in  which  Byron's  memory, 
sensibility,  and  imagination  acted  upon  one  another. 
Coarse,  harsh,  violent  creature  though  she  was,  the 
woman  who  had  nursed  her  little  step-daughter  Au- 
gusta with  affectionate  devotion  in  France  had  not 
been  wanting  in  the  same  womanliness  to  her  own 
child  in  his  time  of  infantile  sickness.     In  a  certain 


A  MOTHER'S   CURSE.  211 

way,  slie  had  loved  him  ;  and  now  the  recollections  of 
long- remembered  and  remote  exhibitions  of  maternal 
tenderness  rose  to  his  mind  and  unmanned  him."  He 
had  called  many  a  lost  companion  an  "only  friend,'' 
and  even  wrote  of  his  Newfoundland  dog  : 

"To  mark  a  friend's  remains  these  stones  arise  ; 
Ineverkneinhutone,  and  here  tie  lies," 

But  we  need  not  accuse  him  of  insincerity  in  his  sor- 
row for  his  mother.  To  a  noble  mind,  as  Byron's  nat- 
urally was,  the  very  faults  of  a  mother  would  endear 
her  memory  and  awaken  the  pity  which  is  akin  to  love. 
The  death  of  a  parent  is  a  terrible  remembrance  of  filial 
duties  neglected,  of  slights  and  disrespect,  of  hardness 
and  of  words  of  reproach,  which,  whatever  the  prov- 
ocation, should  never  be  uttered  by  a  son  to  a  mother. 
One  of  the  first  touches  of  humanity  in  Shakespeare  is 
the  restraint  which  Hamlet  puts  upon  himself  when  he 
appeals  to  the  conscience  and  better  nature  of  his 
mother.  A  mother's  curse  has  ever  been  thought  to 
have  unearthly  horror  in  it,  so  also,  to  our  thinking, 
has  abuse  and  imprecation  from  a  son  to  a  mother,  A 
mind  like  poor  Byron's  would  naturally  feel,  as  he 
looked  on  the  dear  face,  tliat  he  might  have  soothed  in- 
stead of  irritating  her,  and  have  done  more  than  he  had 
done  to  repair  the  sufferings  his  father  had  inflicted 
upon  her.  That  midnight  hour  when  Lord  Byron  sat 
and  wept  in  silence  beside  his  dead  mother' s  cofiin  was 
one  of  the  most  solemn  scenes  which  imagination  can 
picture.  How  must  the  dreadful  past  have  risen  up 
like  a  horrible  dream  before  his  memory.  How  gladly 
would  he   now  call   her    passionate  and   distempered 


212  LORD   BYRON'S   MOTHER. 

spirit  back,  and  say,  "Mother,  let  us  forgive  and  for- 
get the  past.  You  shall  be  henceforth  to  me  a  mother, 
and  I  will  be  to  you  a  son."  How  gladly* would  he 
have  asked  pardon  on  his  knees  for  angry  words  and 
mocking  irony.  But  the  dead  face  had  no  forgiveness 
any  more  than  it  had  pain  or  anger  on  it.  The  troubled 
spirit  had  ceased  from  troubling  ;  the  fierce  passion  was 
at  rest.  He  had  not  seen  her — that  would  add  to  the 
sharpness  of  his  grief.  As  he  had  once  left  her  house 
without  wishing  her  good-by,  so  had  she  at  last  left 
his  on  the  last  lonely  journey,  never  to  return.  The 
past,  the  irreparable  past,  might  well  wring  that  son's 
heart  with  agony  and  make  him  cry  with  the  exceed- 
ing bitter  cry  of  filial  bereavement  and  affection,  "I 
had  but  one  friend  in  the  world,  and  she  is  gone." 

But  how  strange  and  inexplicable  was  Byron' s  char- 
acter. "  The  violence  of  his  grief  for  his  mother,"  says 
Jeaffreson,  "  was  naturally  of  no  great  duration.  In- 
stead of  following  her  coffin  to  the  grave,  he  watched 
the  hearse  and  train  of  mourners  from  the  Abbey  door, 
and,  as  soon  as  they  were  out  of  sight,  ordered  his  ser- 
vant (Young  Rushton)  to  fetch  the  gloves.  AVhile  the 
service  was  being  read  over  Catharine  Gordon  B^a-on, 
her  son  was  sparring  with  the  servant,  throwing, 
as  the  boy  noticed,  unusual  force  into  his  blows. 
Doubtless  in  the  exercise  he  sought  escape  from  men- 
tal distress,  due  in  some  degree  to  filial  affection,  and 
also  in  some  degree  to  uneasiness  at  feeling  so  little  re- 
gret for  his  mother' s  departure.  In  a  few  minutes,  as 
though  the  exercise  had  failed  in  its  object,  he  sudden- 
ly threw  down  the  gloves,  and  went  from  the  servant' s 
sight." 


FEELING   BETWEEN   MOTHER   AND   SON.  213 

Tom  Moore,  in  his  ' '  Life  of  Byron, ' '  takes  perhaps  too 
favorable  a  view  of  his  conduct  as  a  son.  ' '  The  general 
tone  of  the  noble  poet' s  correspondence  with  his  mother 
is  that  of  a  son  performing  strictly  and  conscientious- 
ly what  he  deems  to  be  his  duty  without  the  intermixt- 
ure of  any  sentiment  of  cordiality  to  sweeten  the  task. 
.  .  .  That  such  should  have  been  his  disposition  tow- 
ard such  a  parent  can  be  matter  neither  of  surprise 
nor  blame,  but  that,  notwithstanding  this  alienation, 
which  her  unfortunate  temper  produced,  he  should 
have  continued  to  consult  her  wishes  and  minister  to 
her  comforts  with  such  unfailing  thoughtfulness  as  is 
evinced,  not  only  in  the  frequency  of  his  letters,  but 
in  the  almost  exclusive  appropriation  of  Newstead  to 
her  use,  redounds  assuredly  in  no  ordinary  degree  to  his 
honor,  and  was  even  the  most  strikingly  meritorious 
from  the  absence  of  that  affection  which  renders  kind- 
ness to  a  beloved  object  little  more  than  an  indulgence 
of  self. 

"But,  however  estranged  from  her  his  feelings  must 
be  allowed  to  have  been  while  she  lived,  her  death 
seems  to  have  restored  them  to  their  natural  channel. 
Whether  from  a  return  of  early  fondness,  and  like  all- 
atoning  power  of  the  grave,  or  from  the  prospect  of 
that  void  in  his  future  life  which  this  loss  of  his  only 
link  with  the  past  would  leave,  it  is  certain  that  Byron 
felt  the  death  of  his  mother  acutely,  if  not  deeply. 

"That,  notwithstanding  her  injudicious  and  coarse 
treatment  of  him,  Mrs.  Byron  loved  her  son  with  that 
sort  of  fitful  fondness  of  which  alone  such  a  nature  is 
capable,  there  can  be  little  doubt,  and  still  less  that 
she  was  ambitiously  proud  of  him.     Her  anxiety  for 


214  LORD   BYRON'S   MOTHER. 

the  success  of  Ms  first  literary  essays  may  be  collected 
from  the  pains  which  he  so  considerately  took  to  tran- 
quillize her  on  the  appearance  of  the  hostile  article  in 
the  Review.  As  his  fame  began  to  brighten,  that 
notion  of  his  future  greatness  and  glory,  which,  by  a 
singular  process  of  superstition,  she  had  entertained 
from  his  very  childhood,  became  proportionately  con- 
firmed. Every  mention  of  him  in  print  was  watched 
by  her  with  eagerness  ;  and  she  had  got  bound  togetli- 
er  in  a  volume  a  collection  of  all  the  literary  notices 
that  had  then  appeared  of  his  early  poems  and  satires, 
written  over  on  the  margin  with  abbreviations  of  her 
own,  which  to  my  informant  appeared  indicative  of 
much  more  sense  and  ability  than  from  her  general 
character  we  should  be  inclined  to  attribute  to  her." 

Finally,  in  judging  this  unhappy  mother,  let  us  re- 
member that  her  father  was  a  suicide,  that  she  was  cer- 
tainly demented  during  her  fits  of  passion,  and  that  as 
the  ancients  held  anger  to  be  a  brief  madness,  so  the 
chronic  anger  in  Catharine  Gordon  Byron  may  well 
be  taken  to  indicate  a  chronic  insanity *of  temper. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  THE  REV.  JOHN  NEWTON. 

There  are,  of  course,  different  estimates  of  what 
constitutes  human  greatness,  and  while  every  one 
would  allow  that  Sir  Isaac  Newton  was  a  great  man, 
because  everybody  has  heard  of  him,  and  he  added 
vastly  to  the  mathematical  and  scientific  knowledge  of 
the  world,  there  are  probably  very  few  of  our  readers 
who  ever  heard  of  the  Rev.  John  Newton,  and  of  those 
who  have  met  with  his  name  in  the  familiar  letters  of 
Cowper  and  Mrs.  Unwin,  few  perhaps  would  allow 
him  any  claim  to  the  title  of  a  great  man.  Yet,  if 
there  be  moral  heroes  in  the  world  as  well  as  great 
statesmen,  warriors,  poets,  and  philosophers,  and  if, 
as  we  are  told  upon  the  authority  of  "the  wisest  of 
men,"  he  that  ruleth  his  own  spirit  is  greater  than  he 
who  taketh  a  city,  we  think  that  the  Rev.  John  New- 
ton must  be  admitted  to  a  place  in  the  roll  of  human 
greatness.  Indeed,  the  man  who  emancipates  himself 
from  the  degrading  bondage  of  vice  and  profligacy 
must  have  some  elements  of  real  greatness  in  him, 
even  though  he  himself  would  disclaim  any  part  in  his 
own  progress  from  death  to  life  and  from  darkness  to 
light. 

John  Newton  is  probably  best  known  to  those  who 
are  familiar  with  the  favorite  hymns  of  the  hymn-lov- 
ing English  as  the  joint  author  with  the  poet  Cowper 
and  others  of  the  "Olney  Hymns."      It  was  when 


21G         THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   REV.    JOHN   NEWTON. 

Cowper  resided  with  the  Unwins  at  Olney  that  he 
made  his  first  acquaintance  with  tlie  Rev.  John  New- 
ton, who  became  curate  of  Olney  and  subsequently 
rector  of  the  united  parishes  of  St,  Mary  Woolnoth 
and  St.  Mary  Woolchurch  Haw,  in  the  city  of  London. 
After  his  conversion  he  wrote  several  theological  works 
which  obtained  a  great  fame  and  circulation  for  the 
power  and  pathos  with  which  he  insisted  upon  the  ne- 
cessity of  personal  holiness  and  faith  in  every  human 
being  who  would  be  at  peace  with  God  and  enjoy  the 
hope  of  a  happy  immortality.  Of  them  the  most  fa- 
mous is  his  autobiography,  in  which  he  gives  with 
humiliating  candor  the  painful  excesses  of  his  earlier 
life  as  ^  sailor,  and  we  may  add  pirate,  for  he  was 
deeply  engaged  in  the  African  slave-trade,  long  after 
it  ceased  to  be  tolerated  by  the  laws  of  his  country. 
Like  his  dear  friend,  the  afflicted  but  saintly  Cowper, 
he  lost  his  mother  in  childhood,  John  Newton,  her 
only  child,  being  only  seven  years  of  age  when  she 
was  taken  away  from  him  by  the  hand  of  death.  She 
was  always  of  a  weak  and  delicate  constitution,  yet 
she  devoted  herself  with  a  whole-souled  energy  to  the 
education  of  her  bo}^  He  speaks  of  her  as  "a  pious 
and  experienced  Christian,"  "  in  communion  with  the 
church  of  which  Dr.  Jennings  was  pastor,"  and  as 
such  she  must  have  taught  her  little  son  the  Script- 
ures, which  at  last,  after  long  years  of  bitterness  and 
the  bond  of  iniquity,  were  to  make  him  wise  unto  sal- 
vation. It  was  from  her  undoubtedly  that  he  inherited 
the  poetic  faculty  which  is  clearly  visible  in  those 
favorite  hymns  which  he  composed  at  Olney,  such  as 
"Rejoice,  believe  in  the  Lord,"  "I  asked  the  Lord 


A   MOTHER'S   EARNEST   DESIRE.  217 

that  I  might  grow,"  and  "Begone,  unbelief,  my  Saviour 
is  near."  At  three  years  of  age  she  began  to  teach 
him  to  read,  and  with  so  much  success  that  when  he 
was  five  years  old  he  could  read  with  facility  and  ease 
any  ordinary  book.  At  that  time  he  describes  himself 
and  others  describe  him  as  a  gentle,  docile,  and  affec- 
tionate child,  more  fond  of  his  books  and  thoughts 
than  of  out-door  sport.  It  was  her  heart's  desire  that 
he  should  devote  his  life  to  the  ministry  of  God,  and 
had  his  mother  lived  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the 
good  seed  sown  by  her  would  never  have  been  choked 
by  the  tares  of  sin  and  dissipation.  He  says  himself, 
in  his  autobiography,  when  reviewing  this  period  of  his 
life:  "How  far  the  best  education  may  fail  in  reach- 
ing the  heart  will  strongly  appear  in  the  sequel  of  my 
history  ;  yet  I  think,  for  the  encouragement  of  pious 
parents  to  go  on  in  the  good  way  of  doing  their  part 
faithfully  to  form  their  children' s  minds,  I  may  prop- 
erly propose  myself  as  an  instance.  Though  in  proc- 
ess of  time  I  sinned  away  all  those  early  impressions, 
yet  they  were  for  a  great  while  a  restraint  upon  me  ; 
they  returned  again  and  again,  and  it  was  very  long 
before  I  could  wholly  shake  them  off,  and  when  the 
Lord  at  length  opened  my  eyes,  I  found  great  benefit 
from  the  recollection  of  them.  Further,  my  dear 
mother,  beside  the  pains  she  took  with  me,  often  com- 
mended me  with  many  prayers  and  tears  to  God,  and 
I  doubt  not  but  that  I  reap  the  benefit  of  those  prayers 
to  this  hour." 

By  the  time  John  Newton  was  six  years  of  age  he 
was  studying  Latin,  and  would  have  continued  his 
studies  and  no  doubt  proceeded  in  due  time  to  a  uni- 


218         THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   REV.    JOHN   NEWTON. 

versity,  or  at  least  a  theological  and  clerical  seminary, 
had  not  the  mother,  who  was  so  devoted  to  her  only 
child,  died  at  the  most  critical  time  of  his  young  life. 
His  father  was  captain  of  a  merchant  vessel,  and  soon 
married  again,  and  tlien  the  little  lad  was  sent  to  school, 
where  he  remained  a  little  over  three  years,  and  then, 
when  he  was  but  ten  years  old,  his  father  took  him  to 
sea  with  him.  Those  who  know  anything  of  a  seafar- 
ing life,  and  how  much  danger  there  is  in  it  to  moral 
restraint  and  religious  lorinciple,  notwithstanding  the 
proverbial  kind-heartedness  of  sailors,  can  imagine 
what  an  ordeal  the  life  of  a  cabin-boy  was  to  the  mother- 
less child  of  ten.  In  this  way  he  spent  some  years  in 
an  unsettled  mode  of  life,  the  grace  that  a  good  mother 
had  implanted  in  him  dying  out,  and  all  evil  and  cor- 
rupt affections  taking  root  in  him.  Then  succeeded 
years  of  profligacy,  dissipation,  and  sensual  vice  ;  then 
his  bondage  in  Africa,  and  then  his  rescue  and  conver- 
sion. But  through  it  all  the  memory  of  his  mother 
arose  fresh  and  fragrant,  and  the  still  small  voice  of 
conscience  reiterated  her  instructions  until  her  prayers 
prevailed,  and  her  fallen,  reckless  sailor  boy  renewed 
the  promises  of  his  infancy  and  became  in  the  ministry 
of  the  gospel  the  providential  means  of  converting 
thousands  of  others  to  God. 

John  Newton  was,  as  we  have  seen,  a  remarkably 
precocious  child,  being  able  to  read  and  write  with  fa- 
cility at  an  age  when  most  children  are  only  beginning 
to  talk  and  learn  their  letters.  His  autobiography  and 
other  writings,  after  he  became  a  religious  man  and 
was  ordained  a  clergyman  of  the  Church  of  England, 
show  him  to  have  been  a  man  of  really  great  mental 


A   WORTHY   SON.  219 

ability.  The  learning  displayed  in  some  of  his  books 
upon  Scripture  and  ecclesiastical  history  is  the  more 
remarkable  because  he  never  enjoj^ed  the  advantages 
of  a  university  education,  and  such  a  life  as  he  had  led 
would  be  incompatible  with  habits  of  study  and  the 
acquisition  of  learning.  After  his  conversion,  however, 
he  made  up  for  lost  time,  and  was  remarkable  for  his 
devotion  to  the  studies  of  his  profession.  It  is  perhaps 
chiefly  in  the  will  power  that  the  greatness  of  such  a 
character  appears.  Those  who  know  how  diflBcult  it 
is  to  give  up  even  a  trilling  habit  and  to  forego  some 
little  luxury  can  imagine  what  a  tremendous  will  power 
must  be  exerted  by  a  man  past  middle  life  when  he 
suddenly  throws  off  the  sensual  appetites  and  pleasures 
that  have  enthralled  his  manhood  and  becomes  in  every 
way  the  opposite  of  what  he  was.  If  such  a  little  battle 
with  one's  self  is  difficult,  what  must  be  a  prolonged 
war,  or  a  wholesale  revolution.  Except  that  his  mother 
died  in  his  early  childhood,  John  Newton' s  case  resem- 
bles in  many  ways  that  of  St.  Augustine.  Both  were 
given  over  to  the  same  vices  and  unbelief  and  profanity. 
Both  conquered  themselves,  and  became  new  men  by 
the  grace  that  worked  on  a  receptive  will.  John 
IN'ewton  had  not  as  profound  a  mind  as  St.  Augustine, 
but  he  received  Christianity  with  as  entire  a  self  conse- 
cration and  devoted  the  latter  half  of  his  life  to  convert- 
ing those  who  had  been  notorious  sinners  like  himself. 
He  was  deeply  respected  by  the  clergymen  and  laity 
of  all  the  religious  denominations  in  England,  and  his 
name  is  well  known  in  this  and  every  other  country 
where  evangelical  religion  has  gained  a  hold  upon  the 
people.     His  friends  included  all  the  leading  Christian 


220         THE  MOTHER   OF   THE   REV.   JOHN   NEWTON. 

philanthropists  of  his  time,  but  perhaps  the  sweetest 
glimpses  of  him  which  we  now  obtain  are  during  the 
time  when  he  was  curate  of  Olney,  enjoying  the  high 
companionship  of  Cowper  and  writing  those  hymns 
which  are  still  sung  by  sailors,  such  as  he  was,  upon 
every  sea  and  in  many  a  village  church  and  peasant's 
cottage.  They  will  remain  as  long  as  the  English  lan- 
guage lasts,  and  when  we  read  them  or  hear  them  sung 
it  is  pleasant  to  think  that  but  for  the  influence  of  the 
good  mother,  whom  he  lost  too  soon,  but  whose  prayers 
and  memory  remained  the  saving  impulses  of  his  life, 
and  alone  saved  him  from  utter  and  everlasting  ruin, 
he  would  never  have  learned  a  hymn,  still  less  have 
written  one. 


THE  MOTHEE  OF  MARTIN  LUTHER. 

Four  hundred  years  ago,  on  the  10th  day  of 
November  of  this  year,  there  was  born  in  Eisleben,  a 
small  town  in  Saxony,  at  eleven  o'  clock  in  the  night, 
"  the  solitary  monk  who  shook  the  world." 

Margaret  Lindemann,  daughter  of  a  peasant  of  Neu- 
stadt  in  the  bishopric  of  Wurzburg,  and  wife  of  John 
or  Hans  Luther,  would  have  been  unknown  to  fame, 
and  have  had  no  title  to  "  a  name  to  live,"  but  for  the 
infant,  whose  long  career  was  one  long  "struggling 
toward  the  light,"  whom  she  travailed  with  in  birth 
on  that  November  night.  She  herself  was  so  uncon- 
scious of  "entertaining  unawares"  the  angel  of  the 
churches  of  the  Reformation,  that  Melanchthon,  the 
learned,  gentle,  and  devoted  friend  of  Luther,  tells  us 
that  when  he  questioned  her  as  to  the  time  of  Martin' s 
birth,  she  answered  that  ' '  she  well  remembered  the 
day  and  the  hour,  but  was  not  certain  of  the  year." 
However,  the  point  was  settled  by  James  Luther,  a 
brother  of  Martin's,  who  said  that  in  the  firm  opinion 
of  all  the  family  Martin  Luther  was  born  on  St.  Mar- 
tin's eve,  the  10th  of  November,  1483.  It  was  a  Mon- 
day, and  the  next  day,  Tuesday,  the  father,  full  of 
joy  as  was  the  mother,  and  as  well  they  might  be  be- 
cause a  "man  was  born  into  the  world,"  carried  him 
to  the  neighboring  church  of  St.  Peter,  and  had  him 
baptized,  naming  him  Martin  after  the  saint  on  whose 
eve  he  had  been  born. 


222  THE  MOTHER  OF  MARTIN  LUTHER. 

Luther's  mother  had  been  originally  a  servant  at 
the  baths,  says  An  din,  the  French  author  of  Luther's 
history,  and  by  no  means  friendly  to  his  opinions,  but 
he  admits  that  Margaret  Lindemann  had  always  been 
favorably  known  as  a  virtuous,  chaste,  and  God-fear- 
ing girl.  John  Luther,  whom  she  married,  some  time 
after  he  became  a  miner,  managed  to  purchase  out  of 
his  savings  a  plot  of  ground,  and  we  find  him  subse- 
quently filling  a  petty  magistracy,  delegated  to  him 
by  the  friendship  and  esteem  of  his  fellow-townsmen. 
Martin  was  the  eldest  of  seven  children,  two  of  whom 
died  of  the  plague,  which  desolated  Europe  in  the 
commencement  of  the  sixteenth  century.  One  of  the 
surviving  daughters  married  Nicholas  Emler  of  Mans- 
feld,  whose  name  occasionally  occurs  in  Luther's  cor- 
respondence, and  who  had  often  carried  Martin  in  his 
arms  to  the  house  of  George  Emilius,  and  went  again 
to  fetch  him.  Fifty  years  after,  when  Nicholas  was  an 
old  man,  Luther  reminded  him  of  those  early  acts  of 
kindness,  and  presented  him  with  a  book  on  the 
blank  leaves  of  wliich  he  had  commemorated  them. 
Another  sister  apparently  became  the  wife  of  John 
Rubel,  a  scribe  or  notary. 

The  arms  of  Luther's  father — for  the  German  peas- 
antry had  arms  as  well  as  the  wealthier  citizens — were 
simply  a  hammer  on  a  granite  block.  Martin  was 
never,  in  after  life,  ashamed  of  his  parents.  Gretha  is 
the  familiar  form  for  Margaret,  as  Hans  is  for  John, 
and  Luther  has  consecrated  the  endearing  names  of 
his  parents  in  his  formula  of  marriage  service — 
"Hans,  wilt  thou  take  Gretha?" 

John  Luther,  despite  his  poverty,  did  not  make  his 


SEVERE   DISCIPLINE.  223 

children  work  for  their  daily  bread,  but  sent  them  to 
schools.  He  was  very  ill  once,  and  his  priest,  after 
offering  him  religious  consolation,  suggested  that  he 
should  leave  a  legacy  to  the  church,  John  Luther 
said,  "I  have  many  children,  I  will  give  what  I  have 
to  them,  they  need  it  more/'  He  was  a  God-fearing 
man,  and  he  believed  that  religion  meant  more  than 
profession — it  meant  the  leading  a  good  life  and  the 
right  performance  of  his  duty  to  those  who  were  de- 
pendent upon  him.  John  Martin  worked  hard,  and 
his  wife  shared  his  cares.  Wlrile  he  went  forth  in  the 
mornings  with  his  pick  into  the  mine  shafts,  she  went 
to  the  forest  to  gather  and  carry  fagots  to  their  little 
home.  Their  poverty  required  that  they  should  work 
constantly,  and  this  they  did,  treating  their  children 
kindly  and  fulfilling  their  duty  toward  them,  but 
showing  them  no  special  tenderness.  They  were  very 
strict  in  their  training,  and  Luther  mentions  that  one 
day,  for  merely  stealing  a  hazelnut,  his  mother  beat 
him  till  the  blood  flowed  ;  and  he  said  that  he  had 
such  fear  of  his  father  that  he  always  hid  in  the  chim- 
ney-corner when  he  had  done  anything  to  anger  him. 
We  must  not  judge  of  this  severe  discipline  by  the 
more  civilized  and  Christian  method  of  training  chil- 
dren in  our  own  times.  The  principle  that  to  spare  the 
rod  was  to  spoil  the  child  was  carried  to  the  point  of 
cruelty  four  hundred  years  ago,  especially  in  Ger- 
many, where  an  almost  feudal  and  worse  than  Jewish 
system  of  subjection  prevailed.  Fear  rather  than 
love  was  the  motive  of  obedience  which  parents  and 
teachers  appealed  to  in  children.  Often  indeed,  it  is 
narrated,    that  when  Luther's  father  had  punished 


224  THE   MOTHER  OF   MARTIN   LUTHER. 

liim  with  more  than  usual  severity,  his  mother  took 
him  to  her  arms  and  kissed  his  tears  of  pain  and  hu- 
miliation away.  But  kisses  alternating  with  stripes 
are  not"  a  healthy  parental  discipline  for  children.  We 
have,  unhappily,  poor  Luther' s  own  words  against  the 
system  in  which  he  was  trained.  "My  parents,"  he 
says,  "  treated  me  cruelly,  so  that  I  became  very 
timid ;  one  day  for  a  mere  trifle  my  mother  whipped 
me  till  the  blood  came.  Tliey  truly  thought  they 
were  doing  right ;  but  they  had  no  discernment  of 
character,  which  is  yet  absolutely  necessary,  that  we 
may  know  when,  on  whom,  and  how,  punishment 
should  be  inflicted." 

At  school  poor  Martin's  back  did  not  fare  much 
better  than  at  home.  His  master,  he  tells  us,  flogged 
him  fifteen  times  in  one  day.  "It  is  right,"  he  says 
tenderly,  when  narrating  this  cruel  severity,  "to  pun- 
ish children,  but  at  the  same  time  we  must  love  them." 
These  early  experiences  no  doubt  hardened  him  to  en- 
dure afflictions  in  after  life,  but  they  left  that  sense  of 
injustice  which  is  the  saddest  of  all  reminiscences  of 
childhood. 

When  his  father  and  mother  left  Eisleben,  to  live  at 
Mansfeld,  which  was  only  five  leagues  distant,  little 
Martin  Luther  w^as  but  six  months  old.  The  mines  of 
Mansfeld  were  then  much  celebrated.  It  was  in  that 
town  and  on  the  banks  of  the  Vipper  that  he  learned 
his  first  boyish  sports,  and  developed  his  early  powers 
of  mind  and  body.  Referring  to  that  time,  he  writes  : 
"  My  parents  were  very  poor.  My  father  was  a  wood- 
cutter, and  my  mother  has  often  carried  the  wood  on 
her  back,  that  she  might  earn  wherewith  to  bring  us 


INFERIOR   POSITION   OF    WOMEN.  225 

children  up.     They  endured  the  hardest  labor  for  our 
sakes." 

These  words  need  to  be  read  in  juxtaposition  with 
the  stories  of  their  parental  severity.  The  mother, 
even  the  good  Christian  mother  of  those  days,  was  a 
slave  to  the  husband,  and  the  husband  followed  the 
brutal  roughness  of  the  times.  Blows  were  little 
thought  of,  and  the  rod  was  considered  the  best  medi- 
cine for  youthful  minds,  and  the  best  encouragement 
to  youthful  energy.  A  Saxon  wife  in  Margaret  Lu- 
ther's social  position  would  have  as  soon  thought  of 
buying  an  expensive  dress  without  her  husband's 
leave  as  of  dictating  to  him,  even  by  the  gentlest  re- 
monstrance, how  to  bring  up  a  son.  Whatever  the 
Hans  of  that  period  did  seemed  right  in  the  eyes  of 
Gretha.  It  was  a  Jewish  rather  than  a  Christian  sys- 
tem of  domestic  management.  When  Abraham  would 
offer  up  Isaac,  he  did  not  ask  Sarah's  opinion.  And 
when  John  Luther  laid  the  whij^s  upon  his  boy,  we 
may  be  sure  that  his  hausfrau  went  on  with  her  sew- 
ing or  washing,  with  few  maternal  pangs  for  the  sting- 
ing cuticle  of  her  little  lad.  Happily,  we  have  out- 
grown this  Spartan  system  of  severity  ;  but  is  not  our 
modern  method  of  humoring,  pampering,  coaxing,  and 
complimenting  children  even  worse  in  its  effect  upon 
their  character  ?  If  Luther's  parents  were  stern  and 
strict,  and  visited  each  trivial  fault  with  chastisement, 
they  did  not  spare  themselves  or  begrudge  their  labor 
in  providing  for  his  education.  The  little  Luther,  at 
six  years  of  age,  could  read  and  write  with  ease,  and 
was  encouraged  by  both  his  parents  to  study  dili- 
gently.      M.    Audin,    strongly  prejudiced   as    he    is 


226  THE   MOTHER   OF   MARTIN    LUTHER. 

against  Martin  himself,  praises  Luther's  mother  for 
her  careful  training  of  her  children,  and  says  she  was 
an  ornament  to  her  neighborhood.  By  her  prayers 
and  industry  she  wrought  out  a  good  life-work.  Of 
his  father  he  adds:  "Hans  was  one  of  those  fine 
German  peasants,  of  whom  the  type  is  still  to  be  found 
in  Upper  Saxony.  Devoted  to  labor  and  prayer,  at- 
tached to  his  family,  and  to  his  daughter  especially, 
he  never  murmured  at  Providence,  even  when  another 
child  was  sent  him.  He  delighted  to  recreate  him- 
self of  an  evening  over  a  large  Jug  of  beer,  listen- 
ing to  some  biblical  narrative,  which  James  read  to 
him  out  of  one  of  the  volumes  reluctantly  lent  to  them 
by  the  fathers  of  the  monastery — for  books  were  as 
costly  as  they  were  rare.  He  went  to  rest  betimes, 
said  his  prayers,  and  knelt  at  the  foot  of  Martin' s  bed 
entreating  God  that  his  child  might  grow  up  in  the 
fear  of  the  Lord.''  To  the  same  effect  Gustave  Pfiger 
and  other  earlier  biographers  of  Luther  speak  of  his 
father. 

It  is  not  easy  to  decide  whether  one  or  two  sisters 
of  Luther  lived  to  maturity.  While  one,  and  only 
one  is  mentioned  by  Audin  as  marrying  John  Rubel, 
another,  if  she  be  not  the  same,  at  a  different 
time  is  mentioned  by  Merle  d'Aubigne  as  marrjing 
Nicholas  Emler.  Luther's  father  seems  to  have  been 
on  friendly  terms  with  Melanchthon,  for  we  find  his 
name  as  one  of  the  invited  guests  at  Melanchthon"  s 
marriage,  sitting  at  the  wedding  banquet  among  "Hel- 
lenists, doctors,  and  men  of  science  and  learning." 
It  was  from  the  earnings  of  his  miner's  forge,  with  its 
two  furnaces  for  iron  at  Mansfeld,  that  Hans  Luther 


PARTING    OF   MOTHER   AND   SON.  22 


'^ 


placed  Ms  son  at  school.  "  It  was  from  a  miner's 
fireside,"  says  Mathesius,  "that  one  who  was  destined 
to  recast  vital  Christianity  was  to  go  forth  :  an  ex- 
pression of  God' s  purpose,  by  His  instrumentality,  to 
cleanse  the  sons  of  Levi,  and  refine  them  as  gold  in 
His  furnace."  When,  through  his  integrity,  prudence, 
and  public  spirit,  John  Luther  was  made  one  of  the 
council  of  Mansfeld,  he  and  his  devoted  wife  kept 
open  house  to  the  ecclesiastics  and  scholars  of  the 
vicinity.  There  social  meetings  of  the  citizens  were 
often  held,  and  the  great  questions  that  then  began  to' 
agitate  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century  were 
doubtless  frequently  discussed,  and  the  inquiring  mind 
of  the  boy  Martin  Luther  must  not  only  have  been  set 
to  thinking,  but  have  been  filled  with  a  noble  ambition 
to  do  service  to  God  and  to  humanity  by  his  future 
life.  The  virtuous  example  of  his  father  and  mother 
made  their  mark  upon  his  memory,  and  helped  to 
mould  his  conscience.  AVhen  he  had  learned  the 
rudiments  of  sacred  and  secular  knowledge  at  the 
Latin  School  of  Mansfeld,  in  1497  his  parents  sent  him 
to  the  school  of  the  Franciscans  at  Magdeburg.  The 
mother  parted  with  her  noble  boy  in  tears,  but  ac- 
quiesced in  the  father  s  judgment  that  his  already  re- 
markable abilities  should  be  given  a  wider  opportu- 
nity. A  new  world  of  light  and  science  was  breaking 
on  the  world,  and  Martin  had  already  shown  the  spirit 
of  inquiry  and  the  perseverance  that  make  the  success- 
ful scholar.  He  was  now  fourteen,  and  his  earliest 
and  latest  friend,  John  Reinecker,  accompanied  him  to 
his  new  school.  His  parents'  means,  however,  were  still 
inadequate  to  his  entire  support,  and  after  the  fashion 


228  THE  MOTHER  OF  MAETIN   LUTHER. 

of  students  then,  and  to  a  time  long  subsequent,  the 
boy  had  to  beg  alms  in  his  play  hours  to  obtain  suffi- 
cient food.  He  tells  the  story  himself,  with  his  con- 
stant candor  and  honesty.  "  I  was  accustomed  with 
my  companions  to  beg  a  little  food  to  supply  our 
wants.  One  day,  about  Christmas  time,  we  were  going 
all  together  through  the  neighboring  villages,  from 
house  to  house,  singing  in  concert  the  usual  carols  on 
the  infant  Jesus  born  at  Bethlehem,  We  stopped  in 
front  of  a  peasant' s  house,  which  stood  detached  from 
the  rest,  at  the  extremity  of  the^  village.  The  peasant, 
hearing  us  sing  our  Christmas  carols,  came  out  with 
some  food  which  he  meant  to  give  to  us,  and  asked  in 
a  rough,  loud  voice,  '  Where  are  you  boys  ? '  Terrified 
at  these  words,  we  ran  away  as  fast  as  we  could.  We 
had  no  reason  to  fear,  for  the  peasant  offered  us  this 
assistance  in  kindness  ;  but  our  hearts  were  no  doubt 
become  fearful  from  the  threats  and  tyranny  which  the 
masters  then  used  toward  their  scholars,  so  that  we 
Avere  seized  with  sudden  fright.  At  last,  however,  as 
the  peasant  still  continued  to  call  after  us,  we  stopped, 
forgot  our  fears,  ran  to  him,  and  received  the  food  he 
offered  us."  He  had  scarcely  been  a  year  at  Magde- 
burg when  his  father  and  mother,  hearing  of  the  diffi- 
culty he  found  in  supporting  himself  there,  sent  him 
to  Eisenach,  where  they  liad  relatives,  and  where  there 
was  a  famous  school.  But  the  relatives  there  took 
little  notice  of  him,  and  he  was  obliged,  as  at  Magde- 
burg, to  sing  in  the  streets  for  his  daily  bread. 

How  imj^ressionable  Luther  must  have  been  to  a 
mother's  influence  is  proved  by  hi^  own  saying,  written 
on  the  margin  of  liis  Bible,  "  There  is  nothing  sweeter 


BEGGING   FOR   BREAD.  229 

than  the  heart  of  a  loious  woman."  The  memory  of 
one  who  had  been  almost  a  second  mother  to  him  sug- 
gested the  touching  remark.  Often  when  at  Eisenach 
the  poor  student,  when  he  asked  for  bread,  received 
harsh  words.  More  than  once,  after  these  rebuffs,  he 
shed  tears  of  bitterness  in  secret. 

One  day,  especially,  he  had  been  repulsed  at  three 
houses,  and  was  about  to  return  to  his  lodging  hungry, 
when  he  stood  in  silence  before  an  honest  burgher's 
house.  His  thoughts  were  sad  enough.  It  seemed, 
for  the  moment,  as  if  all  hope  of  pursuing  his  studies 
further  was  at  an  end,  and  young  Luther  saw  nothing 
left  him  but  to  go  back  to  Mansfeld  and  work  at  the 
mines.  Suddenly  a  door  oj)ened,  and  a  woman  ap- 
peared upon  the  threshold.  It  was  the  wife  of  Conrad 
Cotta,  a  daughter  of  the  burgomaster  of  Eilfeld.  Her 
name  was  Ursula,  and  the  chronicles  of  Eisenach  called 
her  the  pious  Shunammite,  because  her  kindness  to  the 
young  prophet  of  the  Reformation  resembled  that  of 
the  Shunammite  woman  in  Scripture  who  gave  the 
bread  of  hospitality  to  the  prophet  Elijah.  She  had 
long  noticed  the  poor  student,  and  heard  with  pain  the 
rough  answers  often  given  him  by  her  neighbors.  She 
had  been  touched  also  by  the  sweetness  of  his  voice, 
and  when  she  beheld  him  overwhelmed  with  sorrow 
near  her  door,  she  beckoned  him  to  enter  and  spread  a 
table  for  him.  Com-ad,  her  husband,  approved  her 
action,  and  was  so  much  pleased  with  Luther  that  a  few 
days  afterward  he  took  him  to  live  in  his  house.  This 
time  was  a  parenthesis  of  joy,  an  oasis  of  refreshing 
and  of  i^eace  in  the  wilderness  of  his  early  life.  Ills 
whole  nature  expanded  under  the  kindly  shelter  gi\'en 


230  THE   MOTHER  OF   MARTIN    LUTHER. 

liim  by  this  noble  Cliristiaii  woman  and  her  husband. 
Here,  besides  pursuing  his  severer  studies,  the  Saxon 
lad,  in  whose  nature  the  soul  of  music  dwelt,  learned 
to  play  the  lute  and  flute.  With  his  lute  he  often  ac- 
companied his  fine  alto  voice,  and  not  only  solaced  his 
own  hours  of  despondency,  but  delighted  his  second 
mother,  Ursula  Cotta,  who  was  extremely  fond  of 
music,  with  his  melodies.  Luther  was  passionately 
fond  of  music  even  to  old  age,  and  composed  both  the 
words  and  music  of  some  of  the  most  beautiful  of 
German  hymns. 

Nor  was  music  the  only  art  he  loved.  He  knew  the 
inspiration  of  the  eye  as  well  as  of  the  ear.  Although 
he  disapproved  of  the  miraculous,  which  popular 
superstition  assigned  to  images  and  pictures,  he  had  a 
sincere  admiration  for  everything  that  was  beautiful  in 
painting,  sculpture,  or  architecture.  Whatever  could 
inspire  great  thoughts  and  lift  the  heart  to  God  was 
sacred  to  him.  Luther  was  not  the  man  to  despise  the 
works  of  the  great  masters  of  painting  any  more  than 
of.  music.  Even  the  prejudiced  M.  Audin  admits  that 
Luther  disapproved  the  destruction  of  images. 
"  Luther,"  he  says,  "  was  indignant,  not  from  a  poetic 
affection  for  art,  but  for  the  sake  of  the  liberty  of 
which  he  was  at  interv^als  the  enlightened  apostle." 
The  three  great  loves  of  Luther  were  for  flowers,  little 
children,  and  music.  Once  when  his  fellow  monks 
found  him  insensible  in  his  cell  from  study  and  priva- 
tion, they  summoned  a  musician,  who  played  some  old 
familiar  strains.  The  poor  monk  revived,  and  his 
spirit  came  to  him  again.  Of  his  love  for  children,  his 
long,  deep  sorrow  for  his  own  dear  daughter  Magdalen 


THOUGHTFUL   OF   HIS   MOTHER.  231 

is  proof.  His  gentle  words  should  find  an  echo  in 
every  parent's  heart.  "  Never  be  hard  with  children. 
Many  a  fine  character  has  been  ruined  by  the  stup»id 
brutality  of  pedagogues.  The  j^arts  of  speech  are  a 
boy's  pillory.  I  was  myself  flogged  fifteen  times  in 
one  forenoon  over  the  conjugation  of  a  verb.  Punish 
if  you  will ;  but  be  kind  too,  and  let  the  sugar-plum 
go  with  the  rod."  Again,  "Be  temperate  with  your 
children  ;  punish  them  if  they  lie  or  steal,  but  be  just 
in  what  you  do.  It  is  a  lighter  sin  to  take  pears  and 
apples  than  to  take  money.  I  shudder  when  I  think 
of  what  I  went  though  myself.  I  had  a  terrible  time 
of  it,  but  she  meant  well." 

That  Luther  thought  often  and  with  sincere  affection 
of  his  mother  was  proved  by  his  anxiety  after  he  be- 
came an  Augustinian  monk,  and  started  w^ith  his  knaj)- 
sack  on  foot  from  Germany  across  the  Alps  to  Italy, 
on  the  occasion  of  his  first  visit  to  Rome,  to  reach  the 
Eternal  City  by  St.  John's  Eve;  for,  says  he,  "you 
know  the  old  Roman  proverb,  '  Happy  the  mother 
whose  child  shall  celebrate  mass  in  Rome  on  St.  John's 
Eve.'  Oh,  how  I  desired  to  give  my  mother  this 
happiness  !  but  this  was  impossible,  and  it  vexed  me 
greatly  to  find  it  so."  His  entering  holy  orders  had 
been  a  blow  to  the  worldly  expectations  which  his  ^ 
parents  had  formed  for  him.  The  law  and  d  wealthy 
marriage  was  what  his  father  hoped  for,  and  on  hearing 
that  his  son  had  suddenly  become  a  monk,  he  Avas  very 
angry,  and  wrote  to  him  declaring  that  he  disowned 
him  as  a  son.  Luther  dedicated  his  book  on  monastic 
vows  to  his  father  subsequently,  and  credits  him  with 
sincere    apprehension    for    his    spiritual    as    well    as 


232  THE   MOTHER   OF   MARTIN    LUTHER. 

worldly  welfare  in  becoming  a  monk.  The  promise  of 
a  brilliant  career  wliich  Martin  had  given  at  the  Uni- 
versity of  Erfurt  might  well  excuse  the  bitter  disap- 
pointment of  his  parents.  But  the  ties  of  blood  are 
not  so  easily  severed.  Luther  himself  says,  in  a  ser- 
mon preached  at  Wittenberg,  that  when  the  plague 
visited  Mansfeld  and  carried  oil  two  of  his  brothers, 
some  one  told  his  father,  "  The  monk  of  Erfurt  is  also 
dead."  This  led  to  his  restoration  to  his  fathers 
affection.  He  still  blamed  him,  however,  for  what  he 
deemed  disobedience  to  his  father  and  mother,  and 
added,  "  God  grant  that  you  may  not  have  mistaken  a 
delusion  of  the  devil  for  a  sign  from  heaven." 

His  poor  mother  must  often  have  thought  of  her 
heroic  son  in  after  times  with  deep  anxiety,  and  re- 
membered him  daily  in  her  prayers.  She  lived  until 
the  year  1531,  surviving  her  husband  scarcely  a  year. 
Her  last  years  were  made  comfortable  by  the  small  in- 
dependence which  was  secured  to  his  parents  by  their 
son.  She  was  buried  beside  her  husband  in  the 
churchyard  of  the  little  village  in  which  they  had  lived 
and  reared  their  worthy  children. 

Few  men  have  ever  had  more  hair-breadth  escai)es 
than  he.  .  But  for  the  Elector  of  Saxony  he  must  have 
lost  his  life  between  Pope  Leo  the  Tenth  and  the  in- 
furiated priesthood  and  Charles  the  Fifth,  who  was  his 
bitterest  enemy,  but  who,  when  standing  by  his  grave 
and  urged  by  those  around  him  to  have  the  bones  (jf 
the  arch-heretic  dug  up  and  burned,  replied  nohl j-,  ' '  I 
war  not  with  the  dead."  It  was  from  the  Emperor 
that  the  Elector  had  exacted  a  safe-conduct  for  the 
solitary  monk,  when  summoned  to  the  Diet  at  Worms. 


THE  DIET  AT   WORMS.  233 

Foul  play  was  no  doubt  intended,  according  to  the  re- 
ligions ethics  of  those  times,  and  a  friendly  warning 
was  given  to  Luther  that  he  had  already  been  con- 
demned by  the  council,  that  his  books  had  been 
burned  by  the  hangman,  and  that  it  would  be  certain 
death  for  him  to  go.  Luther  did  not  wish  to  die,  and 
he  tells  us  that  he  trembled  ;  but  his  usual  courage 
never  forsook  him,  though  the  flesh  was  weak  and  he 
answered,  "  Not  go  to  Worms,  say  you  !  I  will  go  if 
there  are  as  many  devils  in  Worms  as  there  are  tiles 
upon  the  roofs  of  the  houses." 

"  The  roofs,"  says  an  eloquent  historian,  "  when 
he  came  into  the  city,  were  crowded,  not  with  devils, 
but  with  the  inhabitants,  all  collecting  there  to  see 
him  as  he  passed.  A  nobleman  gave  him  shelter  for 
the  night ;  the  next  day  he  was  led  to  the  Town  Hall. 

"  No  more  notable  spectacle  had  been  witnessed  in 
this  x>lanet  for  many  a  century — not  perhaps  since  a 
greater  than  Luther  stood  before  the  Roman  Procurator. 

' '  There,  on  the  raised  dais,  sat  the  sovereign  of  half 
the  world.  There,  on  either  side  of  him,  stood  the 
archbishops,  the  ministers  of  state,  the  princes  of  the 
empire,  gathered  together  to  hear  and  judge  the  son  of 
a  poor  miner  who  had  made  the  world  ring  with  his 
name. 

*'  The  body  of  the  hall  was  thronged  with  knights 
and  nobles — stern,  hard  men,  in  dull,  gleaming  armor. 
Luther,  in  his  brown  frock,  was  led  forward  between 
their  ranks.  The  looks  which  greeted  him  were  not 
all  unfriendly.  Tlie  first  article  of  a  German's  creed 
was  belief  in  courage.  Germany  had  had  its  feuds  in 
times  past  with  the  Popes  of  Rome,  and  they  were  not 


234  THE  MOTHER  OF  MARTIN  LUTHER. 

without  pride  that  a  i^oor  countryman  of  theirs  should 
have  taken  by  the  beard  the  great  Italian  priest. 
They  had  settled  among  themselves  that,  come  what 
would,  there  should  be  fair  play  ;  and  they  looked 
half  admiring  and  half  in  scorn. 

' '  As  Luther  passed  uj)  the  hall,  a  steel-clad  baron 
touched  him  on  the  shoulder  with  his  gauntlet. 
'  Pluck  up  thy  spirit,  little  monk,'  he  said  ;  '  some  of 
us  here  have  seen  warm  work  in  our  time,  but,  by 
my  troth,  nor  I  nor  any  knight  in  this  comi^any  ever 
needed  a  stout  heart  more  than  thou  needest  it  now. 
If  thou  hast  faith  in  these  doctrines  of  thine,  little 
monk,  go  on,  in  the  name  of  God. ' 

"  '  Yes,  in  the  name  of  God,'  said  Luther,  thro  wing- 
back  his  head,  '  in  the  name  of  God,  forward.'  " 

With  the  same  spirit  he  had  previously  conducted 
himself  at  Augsburg,  before  the  cardinal  legate,  whom 
the  Pope  had  sent  to  try  him.  When  Luther  asked 
him  to  point  out  his  errors,  he  answered  haughtily, 
that  he  came  to  command,  not  to  argue.  Entreaties, 
threats,  and  bribes  were  tried  in  vain.  The  poor  Ger- 
man woodcutter  and  miner's  son,  the  half -starved  and 
ill- clad  mendicant  monk  of  the  Augustinian  order,  de- 
fied the  proudest  pontiff  that  ever  occupied  the  i)apal 
throne.  "What,"  said  the  cardinal  legate,  "do  you 
think  the  Pope  cares  for  the  opinion  of  a  German 
boor  ?  The  Pope' s  little  finger  is  stronger  than  all 
Germany.  Do  you  expect  your  princes  to  take  up 
arms  to  defend  you — you,  a  wretched  worm  like  you  ? 
I  tell  you,  no  !  and  where  will  you  be  then — where  will 
you  be  then  f  Luther  answered,  "  Then,  as  now,  in 
the  hands  of  Almighty  God." 


,.i_     JfhiW&aiii-,^^ 


LUTHER  AT  HOME. 


THE   HOME    CIRCLE.  237 

Now  that  four  hundred  years  have  passed  since 
Martin  Luther  first  saw  the  light  in  his  cradle  at 
Eisleben,  it  is  surely  time  to  put  aside  ecclesiastical 
prejudice  and  to  judge  of  him  fairly  and  impartially 
by  his  life  and  by  his  works.  His  enemies  have  repre- 
sented him  as  coarse  and  sensual,  a  glutton  and  a 
vdnebibber.  The  truth  is  that  Luther  was  one  of  the 
most  abstemious  of  men,  a  salt  herring  and  a  crust  of 
bread  being  his  ordinary  dinner.  He  married  because 
he  regarded  the  celibacy  of  the  clergy  as  one  great 
cause  of  the  corruption  of  Christendom,  and  he  knew 
that  to  convince  his  followers  of  the  Christian  lawful- 
ness of  marriage  for  all,  he  must  himself  set  them  an 
example.  We  have  in  his  ' '  Table  Talk' '  one  of  the  most 
delightful  books  in  the  world,  full  of  wit,  good  sense, 
and  charity.  If  Luther  sometimes  spoke  coarsely,  it 
was  the  habit  of  his  age.  He  chose  a  nun  for  his 
wife,  because  he  was  a  priest  who  had  wrongly,  like 
her,  taken  vows  of  celibacy.  She  had  neither  money 
nor  beauty  to  recommend  her,  but  he  found  her  a 
faithful  wife  and  mother.  His  home  life  was  beautiful, 
and  the  domestic  circle,  after  his  children  grew  up, 
was  an  exceedingly  happy  one.  With  his  famUy 
about  him  in  the  evening  he  would  talk  or  read  to 
them,  or  if  so  inclined  he  would  play  to  an  admiring 
audience  ui^on  the  lute,  an  instrument  which  he 
handled  with  some  degree  of  skill. 

We  have  seen  his  love  for  children,  for  flowers, 
for  music.  "Children,"  he  said,  "imagine  heaven 
a  place  where  rivers  run  with  cream,  and  trees  are 
hung  with  cakes  and  plums.  Do  not  blame  them. 
They    are   but    showing    their    simple,    natural,    nn- 


238  THE   MOTHER   OF   MARTIN   LUTHER. 

questioning,  all-believing  faith."  One  day,  after  din- 
ner, when  the  fruit  was  on  the  table,  the  children 
were  watching  it  with  longing  eyes.  ' '  That  is  the 
way,"  he  said,  "in  which  we  grown  Christians  ought 
to  look  for  the  Judgment  Day."  Music  he  called 
^'  the  grandest,  sweetest  gift  of  God  to  man.  Satan 
hates  music,"  he  added  ;  "  he  knows  how  it  diives  the 
evil  spirit  out  of  us."  Long  before  the  science  of 
botany  was  heard  of,  Luther  divined  the  jDrinciple  of 
vegetable  life.  "The  principle  of  ^narriage,"  he  said, 
' '  runs  through  all  creation  ;  and  flowers  as  well  as 
animals  are  male  and  female."  A  garden  was  to 
Luther's  eyes  a  vision  of  Paradise.  One  day,  in  spring 
time,  as  he  was  watching  the  budding  jjlants  and  trees, 
he  exclaimed  : 

"  Praise  be  to  God  the  Creator,  who  out  of  a  dead 
world  makes  all  alive  again.  See  those  shoots,  how 
they  bear  germ  and  swell !  Image  of  the  resurrection 
of  the  dead  !  Winter  is  death,  summer  is  the  resur- 
rection. Between  them  lie  spring  and  autumn  as  the 
period  of  uncertainty  and  change.     The  j)roverb  says, 

'  Trust  not  a  day 
Ere  birth  of  May.' 

Let  us  pray  our  Father  in  heaven  to  give  us  this  day 
our  daily  bread." 

At  another  time  he  said  :  "  If  a  man  could  make  a 
single  rose,  we  should  give  him  an  empire  ;  yet  roses 
and  flowers  no  less  beautiful  are  scattered  in  pi;ofusion 
over  the  world,  and  no  one  regards  them." 

At  another  time :  "  We  are  in  the  dawn  of  a  new 
era ;  we    are    beginning   to   think    something  of  the 


DEFAMED  AND  SLANDERED.  239 

natural  world  which,  was  ruined  in  Adam's  fall.  We 
are  learning  to  see  all  around  us  the  greatness  and 
glory  of  the  Creator.  We  can  see  the  Almighty  hand, 
the  Infinite  goodness,  in  the  humblest  flower.  We 
praise  Him,  we  thank  Him,  we  glorify  Him  ;  we  recog- 
nize in  creation  the  power  of  His  word.  He  spoke, 
and  it  was  there.  The  stone  of  the  peach  is  hard  ;  but 
the  soft  kernel  swells  and  bursts  it  when  the  time 
comes.  An  egg — what  a  thing  is  that !  If-  an  egg  had 
never  been  seen  in  Europe,  and  a  traveller  had  brought 
one  from  Calcutta,  how  would  all  the  world  have  won- 
dered." 

Such  was  the  son  of  Hans  and  Margaret  Luther,  and 
if  one  were  a  spiritualist  and  could  believe  that  the 
spirits  of  the  past  are  conscious  of  the  jDresent,  then 
might  the  peasant  mother  feel  proud,  on  this  10th  day 
of  November,  to  see  Germany,  England,  and  Americo, 
keeping  high  festival  for    her  son,  whom  she  named 
after  St.  Martin.     He  has  been  more  cruelly  defamed 
and  slandered  than  any  other  character  in  history  ; 
but  even  Hallam,  who  accuses  him  of  being  an  antino- 
mian,  only  because  he  believed  in  the  exuberant  grace 
of  God,  admits  that  "  his  soul  was  penetrated  with  a 
fervent  piety,  and  his  integrity  as  well  as  purity  of  life 
are  unquestioned."    His  influence  ux^on  his  own  nation 
to  this  day  is  proof  of  his  greatness.    Bossuet's  misrep- 
resentations and  misquotations  of  Luther,  which  misled 
Hallam,  are  thoroughly  exploded  by  Archdeacon  Hare. 
"  In  the  highest  qualities  of  eloquence,  in  the  faculty 
of  presenting  grand  truths,  moral  and  spiritual  ideas, 
clearly,  vividly,  in  words  which  elevate  and  enlighten 
men's  minds,  and  stir  their  hearts  and  control  their 


240  THE   MOTHER  OF  MARTIN   LUTHER. 

wills,  Luther  seems  incomparably  superior  to  Bossuet, 
almost  as  superior  as  Shakespeare  to  Racine.''  The 
same  learned  and  candid  wiiter  absolutely  annihilates 
Sir  William  Hamilton's  charges  against  Luther,  whom 
he  yet  calls  "  great  and  good, "  which  he  could  not  have 
been  if  they  were  true.  But  the  great  Scotch  logician 
stole  his  spurious  thunder  against  Luther  from 
Bossuet,  who  is  proved  to  be  wholly  untruthful  in  his 
statements  and  inaccurate  in  his  references. 

A  reputation  that  has  stood  the  criticism  of  four 
hundred  years  is  not  likely  to  be  swept  away.  So 
long  as  German  and  English  civilization  exist,  the 
name  of  Martin  Luther  will  be  honored  as  an  apostle 
of  liberty  and  a  witness  against  hypocrisy  and  lies. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  STONEWALL  JACKSON. 

The  conditions  of  life  in  tlie  Sonth  sixty  years  ago 
differed  greatly  from  those  of  to-day.  They  were 
founded  on  different  institutions  and  sentiments  than 
those  which  obtain  at  the  present  time,  and  cannot  be 
judged  by  any  other  standards  than  their  own.  The 
institution  of  slavery,  for  instance,  opx)osed  as  it  was 
to  the  genius  of  republican  institutions,  changed  the 
character  and  altered  the  habits  of  that  part  of  the 
population  of  the  country  under  its  influence.  It  freed 
a  large  proportion  of  the  people  of  the  South  from  the 
necessity  of  labor,  and  left  them  in  enforced  idleness. 
It  was  a  curse  in  this  respect,  and  again  for  the  reason 
that  it  made  labor  degrading,  because  performed  by 
slaves,  and  further,  for  the  reason  that  it  lowered  the 
moral  tone  of  those  who  came  in  immediate  contact 
with  it.  Of  the  many  vices  which  were  the  direct  out- 
growth of  idleness,  none  became  more  prominent  in  the 
South  than  that  of  gambling.  Men  whose  slaves  tilled 
the  land  for  them,  whether  they  were  at  home  or  away, 
and  who  were  secured  from  want  by  the  result  of  slave 
labor,  had  time  to  gamble  ;  and  the  "  debts  of  honor" 
that  were  paid  in  the  South  in  fifty  years  would  have 
made  all  the  poor  of  that  section  independent. 

The  race-course  became  another  avenue  through 
which  the  idle  class  could  expend  their  energies  and 
their  money.     This  class,  to  which  the  father  of  General 


'U2  THE   MOTHER   OF   STONEWALL   JACKSOX. 

Thomas  Jackson  belonged,  was  the  one  from  which 
the  patrons  of  the  turf  and  the  gaming-table  were 
recruited.  He  was  a  well-born  Virginian,  and  a  man 
of  considerable  wealth,  and  his  profession,  that  of  the 
law,  was  one  that  yielded  him  a  good  income  when  he 
married  Julia  Neale,  of  Parkersburg.  His  father  left 
him  a  handsome  estate,  which  he  squandered.  The 
biographers  of  his  son  tell  us  that  "  he  played  high 
and  lost,"  and  when  he  died  his  wife  and  children 
owed  the  one  room  that  sheltered  them  to  charity. 
He  was  induced  to  indorse  for  some  friends,  and  this 
was  another  way  in  which  his  patrimony  and  his  pro- 
fessional income  were  swallowed  up.  He  is  credited 
with  having  had  j)leasing  manners  and  a  generous  dis- 
position, but  his  fellow-men  who  consider  these  quali- 
ties an  offset  to  higher  ones  have  very  vague  ideas  of 
the  sacred  obligations  which  he,  as  a  man  and  a  hus- 
band and  father,  owed  to  society. 

There  have  been  and  there  now  are  fathers  who 
deem  their  duty  to  their  children  ended  when  they 
have  given  them  existence,  and  their  responsibility 
over  when  their  offspring  are  fed  and  clothed.  Such 
men  are  unworthy  to  fill  the  human  relationships  they 
do,  and  as  a  matter  of  fact  they  rarely  fill  them. 
Tliey  assume  them  thoughtlessly,  and  fail  in  their 
obligations.  A  man  remiss  in  his  duties  as  a  father 
rarely  leaves  behind  him  such  a  son  as  Thomas  Jack- 
son, and  truth  compels  the  statement  that  to  his 
mother  was  Jackson  indebted  for  his  leading  character- 
istics. Jonathan  Jackson  destroyed  the  happiness  of 
his  wife  and  blighted  the  future  of  his  children  by  his 
failure  to  provide  for  them,  and  it  is  impossible  to 


THE   SIN   OF   GAMBLING.  243 

look  upon  liim  as  a  genial  or  a  generous  nature.  He 
was  a  selfish  man,  and  a  stranger  to  that  quality  higher 
than  geniality  or  generosity — justice. 

The  lands  that  he  gambled  away  made  their  subse- 
quent owners  rich.  Yet  the  admirers  of  his  son,  who 
knew  that  that  son  at  the  age  of  eight  years  w^as  a  wan- 
derer and  an  outcast,  because  of  his  father's  unfaith- 
fulness, have  seen  fit  to  gloss  over  his  selfishness  and 
use  the  language  of  apology  in  spealdng  of  his  faults. 
The  baleful  sin  of  gambling  has  never  been  adequately 
punished,  and  in  the  South  as  nowhere  else,  except  on 
the  continent  of  Europe,  it  has  been  most  indulgently 
treated.  There  it  is  elevated  to  the  position  of  a  recog- 
nized occupation,  and  whether  indulged  in  as  a  pastime 
or  as  a  i)assion  too  strong  to  be  combated,  it  is 
tolerated. 

A  habit  as  debasing  as  drunkenness,  it  is  even  more 
degrading  in  its  effect.  Where  the  drunkard  is  weak 
of  will  and  demoralized  intellectually,  the  gambler  is 
cruelly  unjust  and  selfish  at  heart.  The  effects  of 
his  vice  upon  himself  are  reflected  in  his  children  to 
the  third  and  fourth  generation  of  restless,  discon- 
tented, and  extravagant  men  and  women.  The  utter 
degradation  of  the  moral  man  through  this  vice  affects 
all  who  come  in  contact  with  him,  and  his  domestic 
relations  are  poisoned  thereby.  His  wife  and  children 
do  not  rise  up  and  call  him  blessed,  and  his  descend- 
ants remember  him  only  with  shame.  There  never 
was  a  gambler  who  made  a  happy  home.  His  house  is 
the  churchyard  of  hope  and  ambition,  and  from  it  do 
not  come  the  fearless  of  spmt  and  the  confident  of 
heart.     There  never  was  a  gambler  who  was  venerated 


244  THE  MOTHER  OF  STONEWALL  JACKSON. 

as  a  parent  by  his  children,  and  there  never  was  one 
whose  death  was  mourned  as  an  irreparable  loss^  or 
whose  memory  was  sincerely  cherished. 

Jonathan  Jackson  died  when  his  son  Thomas  was 
three  years  of  age.  Previous  to  his  death  he  lost  a 
young  daughter,  and  his  widow  and  three  children 
faced  life  without  a  dollar  when  his  funeral  expenses 
were  paid.  There  was  no  money,  no  home,  and  no 
brightness  in  the  future  of  his  family,  who  had  been 
robbed  to  pay  his  debts  incurred  for  the  benefit  of 
others  without  his  wife's  knowledge  and  consent,  and 
who  had  gaml^led  away  what  a  man  of  right  principle 
would  have  considered  not  his  own,  but  his  wife's  and 
his  children's.  A  true  man,  who  takes  upon  himself 
the  responsibilities  of  husband  and  father,  no  longer 
considers  himself  or  his  future  apart  from  them. 
They  are  the  hostages  he  has  given  to  fortune,  and 
his  best  years  are  dedicated  to  their  care  and  protec- 
tion. None  but  cowardly  and  unformed  natures  would 
assume  the  sacred  office  of  parent  with  any  less  unself- 
ish intentions,  "and  a  higher  civilization  than  ours  will 
make  this  all-important  subject  one  of  early  and  care- 
ful consideration.  Had  the  law  recognized  Mrs.  Jack- 
son as  an  equal  in  tlje  marriage  contract,  it  would  not 
have  been  possible  for  her  husband  to  have  left  her 
destitute  and  her  children  beggars. 

She  sheltered  herself  through  the  kindness  of  the 
Masons,  and  tried  to  keep  her  little  flock  together  b}^ 
taking  in  sewing  and  teaching  a  small  school.  The 
struggle  was  an  unequal  one,  and  her  strength  wasted 
away.  She  is  described  as  having  been  a  very  hand- 
some and   graceful  woman,  and  unusually  cultured. 


A   SECOND   MARRIAGE.  245 

Much  of  the  talent  her  children  possessed  they  in- 
herited unmistakably  from  her.  She  was  extremely 
religious,  and  was  naturally  a  happy  person.  The 
anxiety  of  mind  she  endured  caused  her  great  depres- 
sion at  times,  and  she  suffered  torture  in  anticipation 
of  the  separation  from  her  children  that  seemed  inevi- 
table. Her  husband' s  relatives  appear  to  have  taken 
a  negative  interest  in  her,  and  she  struggled  and  sor- 
rowed on  for  three  vears  after  her  husband' s  death. 
There  is  no  earthly  anguish  to  be  compared  to  that  in- 
flicted by  poverty  under  the  circumstances  of  this 
mother's  life,  and  it  can  only  be  felt  by  a  mother  ;  it  is 
unintelligible  and  inexplicable  to  all  others.  All  that 
kept  her  up  was  the  fervent  faith  she  had  in  God. 

A  suitor  in  the  person  of  a  Mr.  Woodson,  a  man 
greatly  her  senior  in  years,  and  almost  as  poor  as  her- 
self, appeared,  and  to  the  surprise  of  her  friends  won 
her  consent  to  a  marriage.  Her  husband's  family  in- 
terfered, and  tried  to  prevent  what  they  probably  saw 
was  a  mistake,  but  she  married  him.  Mr.  Woodson 
lived  in  another  county,  and  as  he  was  unable  to 
provide  for  her  little  sons  and  daughter,  she  was 
perforce  compelled  to  ask  their  father's  kindred  to 
take  them.  Little  Thomas  was  the  youngest  child, 
and  he  was  six  years  old  at  this  time.  The  parting 
with  him,  her  idol,  was  the  hardest  of  trials.  He  was  a 
pretty,  blue-eyed  boy,  who  claimed  her  attention  and 
responded  to  her  tender  affection  and  endearments. 
Even  this  little  child  had  to  be  given  up,  and  the  de- 
scription of  tlie  parting  is  most  touching.  So  bitter 
was  the  pain  to  his  mother  that  the  event  was  im- 
pressed upon  the  little  boy's  memory  indelibly.     His 


246  THE   MOTHER   OF   STONEWALL   JACKSON. 

own  distress  was  pitiful.  A  faitliful  old  slave,  who 
had  belonged  to  his  father,  was  sent  to  take  him  from 
his  riiother  to  his  uncle's  house,  his  new  home.  The 
child  was  to  ride  behind  him  on  horseback,  and  early 
in  the  morning  "  Uncle  Robinson"  came  for  him.  The 
poor  mother  made  all  the  excuses  she  could  for  delay  ; 
she  put  up  with  her  own  hands  a  lunch  for  her  little 
boy  to  eat  on  the  way,  and  the  colored  man  was  en- 
treated to  be  thoughtful  of  him.  The  mother,  with 
white  face  and  quivering  lips,  kissed  her  boy  good-by, 
and  he  was  lifted  up  and  placed  on  the  horse.  The 
kind-hearted  slave  heard  a  last  injunction  and  started, 
but  before  he  had  gone  far  he  was  called  back  by  the 
agonized  mother,  who  took  her  boy  again  in  her  arms 
and  gave  way  to  such  an  outburst  of  weeping  that  the 
scene  was  never  obliterated  from  the  child's  memorv. 
He  heard  the  sobs  of  his  broken-hearted  mother 
through  all  his  life,  and  they  saddened  every  year  of  it. 
The  picture  of  this  unfortunate  young  mother's  grief 
is  very  touching,  but  practical  minds  can  but*  note 
the  inexcusableness  of  her  position,  and  conclude  that 
much  of  her  troubles  were  of  her  own  making.  She 
was  not  true  to  herself  ;  perhaps  she  did  not  know  how 
to  be,  but  at  all  events  a  loving  mother  should  have 
seen  her  duty  clearer  than  to  have  married  a  man  who 
demanded  the  sacrifice  she  made  for  his  sake.  It  is 
very  pathetic  to  read  of  her  parting  with  her  little 
children,  particularly  with  her  youngest  son,  but  the 
folly  of  such  suffering  is  too  apparent  to  awaken  great 
sympathy.  A  man  who  was  willing  to  accept  such  a 
sacrifice  was  unworthy  of  it,  and  a  woman  of  more 
practical  ideas  would  have  declined  his  hand  promptly. 


DEATH  OF  MRS.    JACKSON.  247 

She  married,  separated  herseli  from  her  children,  who 
were  themselves  seiDarated  from  each  other,  and  in  a 
year  she  gave  birth  to  a  son  and — died. 

Her  little  boys  and  her  only  daughter  were  sent  for 
when  it  was  seen  that  she  was  dying,  and  the  sight  of 
them  gave  her  comfort  in  her  last  hours.  Little 
Thomas  sat  upon  her  bed  beside  her,  prattling  in  his 
delight,  and  she  forgot  the  nearness  of  death  in  the 
presence  of  her  long-absent  boy.  Her  rapidly  failing 
strength  was  a  cruel  admonition  that  she  must  soon 
die,  and  her  children  were  gathered  about  her  bed  to 
take  their  last  fond  farewells.  The  end  came  quickly, 
and  when  all  was  over  they  were  sent  back  to  their 
adopted  homes,  never  more  to  be  united  again. 
Thomas,  though  the  youngest,  was  so  deeply  affected 
that  he  said  years  afterward  "  the  wholesome  impres- 
sion of  her  dying  instructions  and  prayers,  and  of  her 
triumph  over  the  grave,  have  never  been  erased  from 
my  heart." 

Mrs.  Jackson  was  certainly  a  Christian  woman,  and 
she  ineffaceably  impressed  her  own  spiiit  of  prayer 
upon  this  child.  His  life  was  a  perfect  exemj^lification 
of  her  beliefs  and  hopes.  He  remembered  her  with 
tenderness  all  his  life,  and  idealized  her  beauty  and 
sweetness  of  disposition.  She  suffered  in  health,  and 
her  misfortunes  had  made  her  too  emotional  for  her 
worldly  interests.  Many  of  the  trials  which  she 
attributed  to  the  will  of  her  heavenly  Father  were  of 
her  own  making,  and  were  the  result  of  her  own  want 
of  confidence  in  herself.  She  had  been  taught  to  con- 
sider her  relationship  as  wife  and  mother  of  paramount 
importance,  and  her  own  welfare  of  no  moment.     The 


248  THE   MOTHER   OF    STONEWALL   JACKSON. 

false  doctrine  inculcated  in  women  that  they  are  (jf 
themselves  nothing  as  compared  to  the  sacred  offices 
they  fill  is  pernicious  and  soul-destroying,  and  they 
need  to  learn  no  lesson  so  much  as  that  expressed  in 
Hamlet  by  old  Polonius  to  the  players  : 

"  To  thine  own  self  be  true, 
And  it  shall  follow  as  the  night  the  day, 
Thou  canst  not  then  be  false  to  any  man. ' ' 

Neither  wifehood  nor  motherhood  are  greater  than 
womanhood,  nor  do  they  change  a  woman's  char- 
acter ;  her  feelings  may  be  deepened  in  consequence, 
but  she  remains  the  same,  and  is  greater  in  herself 
than  in  her  wifely  or  maternal  office.  Let  us  then 
put  away  the  false  and  hurtful  teachings  with  which 
women  have  been  indoctrinated  always,  and  better  the 
world  by  eradicating  them.  Women  have  crucified 
themselves  long  enough  on  the  altar  of  wifehood  and 
maternity,  and  filled  the  world  in  consequence  with 
discordant  and  unhealthy  children.  They  have  erro- 
neously mistaken  the  teachings  of  mere  human  beings 
for  the  utterances  of  Christ,  and  have  dethroned  them- 
selves through  mistaken  zeal. 

The  mother  of  Thomas  Jackson  should  have  lived  to 
the  fulness  of  years,  and  been  to  her  children  a  guide 
and  friend.  Her  education  in  the  direction  of  woman' s 
duties  was  wrong,  and  she  accepted  marriage  a  second 
time  in  violation  of  every  duty  she  owed  herself.  As 
to  her  duty  as  a  mother,  it  stands  to  reason  that  a  wo- 
man who  was  physically  unable  to  take  care  of  herself 
was  unfitted  to  again  assume  the  office  of  maternity. 

The  calamities  that  followed  were  dei3lorable.     The 


THE   THREE   CHILDREN.  249 

babe  whose  birth  cost  her  her  life  lived  an  invalid  and 
died  of  consumption,  and  the  three  children  whom 'she 
had  given  up  in  order  to  marry  again  were  bereft  of  a 
mother's  love,  and  to  their  j)angs  of  sex:)aration  was 
added  the  misery  of  complete  orphanage.  Surely  the 
fate  of  woman  was  never  sadder  or  more  to  be  regretted 
than  that  of  the  mother  of  Stonewall  Jackson. 

The  eldest  son,  Warren,  was  a  rebellious  boy,  and 
his  short  life  was  full  of  unhappiness.  The  daughter, 
more  fortunate  in  her  home  than  either  of  her  brothers, 
grew  to  womanhood  in  the  house  of  an  aunt.  Little 
Thomas  went  from  his  mother  to  live  with  a  sister  of  his 
father,  and  his  adopted  home  was  near  Clarksburg.  He 
remained  there  a  year,  a  quiet  and  subdued  child.  For 
some  reason  his  uncle  was  stern  to  him,  and  one  day, 
when  only  eight  years  old,  he,  without  saying  a  word 
to  any  one,  walked  the  four  miles  that  lay  between  his 
home  and  Clarksburg,  and  unannounced  appeared  at 
the  house  of  Judge  Jackson,  a  cousin  of  his  father's, 
and  asked  Mrs.  Jackson  for  his  dinner. 

The  child  as  he  sat  at  the  table,  calmly  eating  the 
food  that  was  placed  before  him,  said  to  his  hostess, 
"  I  have  quit  Uncle  Brake  ;  we  don't  agree,  and  I  shall 
not  go  back  any  more.' '  His  cousin  expostulated  with 
him,  and  tried  to  persuade  him  to  return.  He  de- 
clined to  do  so,  and  this  cousin  permitted  him  to  leave 
her  house  for  that  of  another  relative  in  the  town.  At 
this  relative's  house  he  stayed  all  night,  and  there 
made  the  same  announcement  that  he  should  return 
no  more  to  his  uncle's  home.  The  stranQ:e  indifference 
of  these  relatives  to  the  little  wanderer  cannot  be  ex- 
plained.    The  child  was  a  mere  babe  in  years,  and  yet 


250  THE    MOTHER   OF    STONEWALL   JACKSON. 

they  let  Mm  go  from  them,  the  last  one  knowing  that 
he  -proposed  to  walk  a  journey  of  eighteen  miles  to 
where  his  brother  was,  and  yet  opposed  no  objection 
and  ai)parently  offered  no  assistance.  If  the  mother 
with  her  sx)irit-eyes  saw  the  little  fellow  in  his  hour  of 
neglect  and  wanderings,  what  must  have  been  her  feel- 
ings regarding  him  I  And  how  must  she  have  grieved 
over  the  fate  that  de23rived  him  of  the  care  of  a  parent 
in  his  infant  v^ears  ! 

The  long  journey  was  accomx)lished  at  last,  and 
Thomas  reached  the  home  of  his  uncle,  Cummins 
Jackson,  where  he  had  the  pleasure  of  being  united  to 
his  brother  again.  The  uncle  was  a  father  to  the  two 
boys,  and  four  years  were  passed  happily  in  his 
house.  Tlien  the  unhappy  disposition  of  the  eldest 
brother  caused  trouble,  and  on  his  refusal  to  attend 
school  regularly  his  uncle  became  indignant.  The  lad 
announced  his  determination  to  leave  his  adox)ted 
home,  and  his  relative  not  only  permitted  him  to  go, 
but  to  take  his  brother,  then  twelve  years  of  age,  with 
him.  The  two  children,  not  knowing  what  else  to  do, 
went  to  the  house  of  an  uncle  of  their  mother  s.  They 
were  hospitably  treated,  but  the  disobedience  of  the  eld- 
est brother  again  caused  a  quarrel,  and  he  left  this  home 
taking  with  him  the  now  thoroughly  wretched  Thomas. 

Long  months  passed  before  the  children  were  heard 
of  again.  They  went  down  the  Ohio  River  on  a  llat- 
boat,  and  then  down  the  Mississippi  until  they  reached 
a  lonely  island  opposite  the  south-western  corner  of 
Kentucky.  They  had  earned  their  food  by  first  one 
occupation  and  then  another  until  they  landed  on  this 
island,  and  there  they  cut  wood  for  the  Mississippi 


RETURN   OF   THE   WANDERERS.  5251 

steamers.  They  suffered  for  the  barest  comforts  of  life, 
and  both  children  had  chills  and  fever.  They  remained 
throughout  the  summer  in  this  unhealthy  place,  and 
in  the  autumn,  when  it  was  apparent  that  they  were 
unable  to  get  well,  they  were  advised  to  go  back  to 
their  friends.  A  kind-hearted  steamboat  captain  who 
knew  them  gave  them  their  x)assage  back  to  Virginia, 
and  little  Thomas,  thoroughly  sick  of  his  experiences 
and  determined  not  to  be  subjected  to  his  brother's 
will  any  longer,  returned  to  his  uncle's  home  and  was 
welcomed  back  by  his  relatives.  Warren  sought  a 
home  with  his  aunt,  Mrs.  Brake,  with  whom  Thomas 
had  made  his  first  home,  and  died  of  consumption, 
which  disease  had  been  developed  by  his  hardships. 

Thomas  never  left  his  Uncle  Cummins  again  until  he 
went  to  West  Point.  He  became  a  great  favorite  with 
this  bachelor  uncle,  and  his  life  was  happier  than  it 
had  been  before  since  his  mother's  death.  He  renewed 
his  studies  with  increased  ardor,  and  manifested  a 
strong  desire  to  obtain  an  education.  His  sister  lived 
in  another  county  with  a  sister  of  her  mother,  and 
Thomas  rarely  saw  her,  though  he  was  devoted  to  her. 
It  is  said  that  the  first  money  he  ever  made  he  invested 
in  a  silk  dress  for  her. 

He  began  to  earn  his  living  long  before  he  should 
have  left  school,  and  when  he  sought  the  appointment 
to  West  Point  his  friends  did  not  consider  him  sufii- 
ciently  advanced  to  secure  the  i^lace.  Nothing  daunt- 
ed, he  made  application,  and  while  awaiting  the  reply 
of  the  Congressman  who  had  the  appointment  to 
make,  he  reviewed  his  studies,  aided  by  a  lawyer 
neighbor,  who  acted  as  his  tutor.     Growing  impatient 


252  THE   MOTHER   OF    STONEWALL   JACKSOX. 

of  the  delav  of  the  official,  he  induced  his  uncle 
to  let  him  go  to  Washington  and  make  a  personal 
effort.  The  energy  and  determination  of  the  lad 
j)leased  the  official,  who  went  with  him  to  the  War 
DexDartment  and  secured  his  commission  for  him. 
From  there  he  went  to  West  Point,  where  he  had  a 
hard  time  at  first  owing  to  his  previous  want  of  train- 
ing, but  his  personal  character  won  him  the  respect  of 
the  instructors,  and  his  steady  efforts  enabled  him  to 
surmount  the  difficulties  that  lay  in  his  pathway.  He 
said  of  himself  years  afterward  that  he  had  resolved 
to  be  great  and  good,  and  he  x)ossessed  a  nature  that 
enabled  him  to  accomplish  his  resolution.  He  was 
remarkable  for  his  strict  truthfulness  and  a  high  stand- 
ard of  morals.  Already  he  was  become  the  j)raying 
son  his  mother  had  hoped  he  might  be.  Jackson  was 
graduated  from  the  Military  Academy  in  1846,  and  as 
the  war  had  broken  out  between  Mexico  and  the 
United  States  he  was  at  once  ordered  to  take  the  field. 
He  was  breveted  captain  for  his  bravery  at  the  battle 
of  Churubusco.  His  conduct  throughout  the  war  was 
such  as  to  commend  him  to  the  respect  and  admiration 
of  his  superiors.  The  only  falsehood  he  ever  remem- 
bered telling  in  his  life  was  during  this  war.  He  was 
leading  his  men  through  a  pass  infested  by  Mexican 
bandits,  when  they  became  panic-stricken  and  refused 
to  go  forward.  The  bullets  were  flying  about  them, 
when  he  called  to  them  to  follow  him,  exclaiming, 
"  Don't  you  see  there  is  no  danger  ?"  There  was  great 
danger  and  he  well  knew  it. 

By  the  time  that  he  was  elected  a  member  of  the 
corps  of  professors  at  the  Virginia  Military  Institute  at 


VISITS   HIS   MOTHER'S   GRAVE.  253 

Lexington,  in  1851,  his  Christian  character  was  well 
established.  All  his  comrades  in  arms  knew  him  to  be 
morbidly  sensitive  on  the  subject  of  his  duty  and 
responsibility  as  a  professing  Christian,  and  respected 
him  for  his  unaffected  and  true  piety. 

In  1853,  two  years  after  he  was  established  in  Lex- 
ington, he  was  married  to  Miss  Eleanor  Junkin,  and 
for  the  first  time  in  his  life  had  a  home.  For  fourteen 
months  they  lived  together,  when  Mrs,  Jackson  died. 
Some  time  after  that  event,  in  order  to  compose  his 
mind  and  regain  his  health,  he  visited  Western  Vir- 
ginia and  spent  some  weeks  with  his  relatives.  While 
there  he  went  to  his  mother's  grave,  and  in  a  letter 
which  he  wrote  from  Lexington  to  his  uncle  after  his 
return,  he  says  : 

"  I  stopped  on  my  way  to  see  the  Hawk's  Nest,  and 
the  gentleman  with  whom  I  put  up  was  at  my  moth- 
er's burial  and  accompanied  me  to  the  cemetery  for 
the  purpose  of  pointing  out  her  grave  to  me.  But  I 
am  not  certain  that  he  found  it  ;  there  was  no  stone  to 
mark  the  spot.  Another  gentleman  who  had  the-  kind- 
ness to  go  with  us  stated  that  a  wooden  head-  or  foot- 
board with  her  name  on  it  had  been  put  up  ;  but  it 
was  no  longer  there.  A  depression  in  the  earth  only 
marked  her  resting-place.  When  standing  by  her 
grave,  I  experienced  feelings  with  which  I  was  until 
then  a  stranger.  I  was  seeking  the  si)ot  partly  for  the 
purpose  of  erecting  something  to  her  precious  memory. 
On  Saturday  last  I  lost  my  j)orte-monnaie,  and  in  it  was 
the  date  of  my  mother's  birthday.  Please  give  it  to 
me  in  your  next." 

In  1857  Major  Jackson  was  married  a  second  time, 


254  THE   MOTHER   OF   STONEWALL   JACKSON. 

his  wife  being  Miss  Mary  Ann  Morrison,  the  daugliter 
of  a  Presbyterian  clergyman.  Soon  after  his  marriage 
he  became  the  hai^py  OA\Tier  of  a  home,  where  he  lived 
the  pleasant  years  that  intervened  before  the  war 
broke  out.  When  war  came  npon  the  country  he  j^re- 
pared  for  the  conflict,  and  soon  was  called  ux^on  to 
take  up  arms  in  defence  of  his  native  State. 

The  cause  for  which  General  Jackson  fought  and 
died  was  long  ago  overthrown.  He  went  into  the 
strife  believing  that  the  doctrine  of  State  sovereignty 
was  the  essential  bulwark  of  the  liberties,  not  only  of 
the  Southern  people,  but  of  all  the  States  of  the  Union. 
The  doctrine  was  defeated  at  the  jDoint  of  the  bayonet, 
and  the  Union  was  maintained.  General  Jackson, 
conscientiously  took  up  arms  against  the  government, 
and  he  fought  with  the  same  ardor  that  he  prayed. 
His  career  as  a  soldier  has  been  admired  by  all  nations, 
and  his  character  as  a  man  was  beautifullv  svmmetri- 
cal  and  noble.  His  history  abounds  in  evidences  of 
humanity  and  kindly  thought  of  others,  and  of  all  the 
military  heroes  of  the  South  none  will  be  remembered 
by  posterity  with  greater  admiration  and  resx:)ect  than 
Stonewall  Jackson.  His  jDersonal  character  secures 
him  the  true  fame  that  is  his,  and,  aside  from  his  ex- 
ploits as  a  commander,  in  which  he  was  always  suc- 
cessfid,  he  was  the  ideal  soldier  in  that  he  shared  every 
danger  with  his  men,  was  with  them  in  suifering,  and 
was  generous  in  his  praise  of  their  exploits.  The  night 
before  the  battle  of  Manassas,  after  a  long  march, 
his  tired  soldiers  were  halted  at. two  o'clock  in  the 
morning  for  a  rest.  They  were  so  weary  that  no  senti- 
nels were  posted,  and  Jackson,  when  he  learned  that 


HIS   TITLE   OF   STONEWALL.  255 

« 

his  camp  was  unguarded  and  was  asked  if  some  of  the 
men  should  not  be  w-akened,  rei)lied,  "  Let  the  poor 
fellow^s  sleep.  I  will  guard  the  camj)  myself."  And 
during  the  rest  of  the  night  he  walked  guard  or  sat 
on  the  fence  w^atching  over  the  safety  of  the  worn-out 
men  who  lay  on  the  ground  slumbering  after  their 
long  march.  Such  acts  as  this  endeared  him  to  his 
soldiers  and  made  him  the  most  popular  commander, 
next  to  Lee,  in  the  Confederate  army.  His  title 
"  Stonewall "  was  given  him  on  the  day  of  the  battle 
of  Manassas.  For  hours  his  command  lay  motionless, 
exposed  to  the  death-dealing  fire  of  the  enemy,  which 
caused  sad  havoc  in  their  ranks.  Jackson  rode  back 
and  forth  in  front  of  his  line  cheering  his  men  with  his 
calm  demeanor  and  his  animated  spirit.  General  Bee's 
command,  which  was  not  far  from  Jackson's,  com- 
menced to  fall  back  before  the  terrific  blaze  of  fire  that 
came  from  the  enemy.  It  was  then  that  Jackson  called 
to  him  to  give  them  the  bayonet,  and  the  gallant  Bee, 
dashing  back  to  his  wavering  men,  pointed  to  Jack- 
son's command  and  exclaimed,  "  There  is  Jackson 
standing  like  a  stone  wall.  Rally  behind  the  Vir- 
ginians. Let  us  determine  to  die  here  and  we  will 
conquer.  Follow  me."  These  words  became  memo- 
rable because  they  were  the  last  he  uttered.  In  a  few 
moments  he  was  killed  as  he  headed  the  charge  against 
the  foe.  Jackson's  troops,  obeying  their  commander's 
order,  charged  with  bayonets,  yelling  as  he  had  directed 
like  furies,  and  won  the  day.  That  night  as  the  sol- 
diers talked  of  the  events  of  the  day  he  was  called  the 
stone  wall  that  saved  the  field,  and  soon  the  word  was 
associated  indelibly  with  his  name. 


256  THE   MOTHER  OF   STONEWALL  JACKSON. 

The  day  after  the  battle  a  crowd  was  assembled 
about  the  post-office  in  Lexington,  Virginia,  awaiting 
the  opening  of  the  mail.  Jackson's  pastor  was  among 
them,  and  a  letter  was  handed  to  him  which  he  saw 
w^as  in  Jackson's  handwriting,  and  he  at  once  exclaimed 
to  the  anxious  grouj)  that  he  could  give  them  the  facts 
in  a  moment.     The  letter  read  : 

"  My  Dear  Pastor  :  In  my  tent  last  night,  after  a  fatiguing  day's 
service,  I  remembered  that  I  failed  to  send  you  my  contribution  for 
our  colored  Sunday-school.  Inclosed  you  will  find  my  check  for  that 
object,  which  please  acknowledge  at  your  earliest  convenience,  and 
oblige  Yours  truly, 

"Thomas  Jackson." 

Considering  the  circumstances  this  was  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  letters  ever  penned.  Men  who  heard 
it  turned  and  stared  at  each  other  in  surprise,  and  be- 
fore night  that  letter  was  as  widely  known  and  as 
much  commented  upon  as  the  news  of  the  victory  at 
Manassas. 

The  only  daughter  of  General  Jackson,  and  his  only 
child,  was  named  after  his  mothei.  In  April,  1863, 
writing  from  his  camp  to  a  friend,  he  said  : 

' '  I  have  a  daughter,  and  have  named  her  Julia,  after 
mother.  I  don't  suppose  you  have  any  recollection  of 
my  mother,  as  she  has  been  dead  nearly  thirty  years. 
In  the  summer  of  1855  I  visited  her  grave  in  Fayette 
County." 

On  his  death-bed  that  sad  Sunday  morning,  the  10th 
of  May,  this  little  daughter  w^as  brought  to  his  bed- 
side to  receive  his  last  embrace.  "  As  soon  as  she  ap- 
peared in  the  doorway,  which  he  was  watching  with 
his  eyes,  his  face  was  lit  up  with  a  beaming  smile,  and 


DEATH   OF   GENERAL   JACKSON.  257 

he  motioned  her  toward  him,  saying  fondly,  '  Little 
darling  ! '  She  was  seated  on  the  bed  by  his  side,  and 
he  embraced  her,  and  endeavored  to  caress  her  with 
his  poor  lacerated  hand,  while  she  smiled  upon  him 
Avith  infantile  delight.  Thus  he  continued  to  toy  with 
her,  until  the  near  approach  of  death  unnerved  his 
arm,  and  unconsciousness  settled  down  upon  him." 

His  dying  experiences  were  not  widely  different 
from  those  of  his  mother.  Her  perfect  faith  and 
serenity  in  the  face  of  the  last  enemy  of  humanity 
called  forth  from  her  husband  the  remark,  "No  Chris- 
tian on  earth,  no  matter  what,  evidence  he  might  have 
had  of  a  happy  hereafter,  could  have  died  with  more 
fortitude.  Perfectly  in  her  senses,  calm  and  delib- 
erate, she  met  her  fate  without  a  murmur  or  a  strug- 
gle. Death  for  her  had  no  sting  ;  the  grave  could 
claim  no  victory.  I  have  known  few  women  of  equal, 
none  of  superior  merit." 

On  his  death-bed  her  son  said  to  his  chaplain,  the 
Rev.  Mr.  Lacy,  who  had  just  arrived  at  his  tent : 
"  You  see  me  severely  wounded,  but  not  dejoressed, 
not  unhappy.  I  believe  that  it  has  been  done  accord- 
ing to  Grod'  s  holy  will,  and  I  acquiesce  entirely  in  it. 
You  may  think  it  strange,  but  you  never  saw  me  more 
perfectly  contented  than  I  am  to-day,  for  I  am  sure 
that  my  heavenly  Father  designs  this  affliction  for  my 
good.  I  am  perfectly  satisfied  that  either  in  this  life 
or  in  that  which  is  to  come  I  shall  discover  that  what 
is  now  regarded  as  a  calamity  is  a  blessing.  And  if  it 
appears  a  great  calamity  (as  it  surely  will  be  a  great 
inconvenience)  to  be  deprived  of  my  arm,  it  will  result 
in  a  great  blessing.     I  can  wait  until  God,  in  His  own 


258  THE  MOTHER  OF   STONEWALL  JACKSON. 

time,  shall  make  known  to  me  the  object  He  has  in 
thus  afflicting  me.  But  why  should  I  not  rather  re- 
joice in  it  as  a  blessing,  and  not  look  on  it  as  a  calam- 
ity at  all  ?  If  it  were  in  my  power  to  replace  my  arm, 
1  would  not  dare  to  do  it  unless  I  could  know  it  was 
the  will  of  my  heavenly  Father. 

"  He  added  that  he  thought  when  he  fell  from  the 
litter  that  he  should  die  upon  the  field,  and  gave  him- 
self into  the  hands  of  his  heavenly  Father  without  a 
fear.  He  declared  that  he  was  in  possession  of  perfect 
peace,  while  thus  expecting  immediate  death.  '  It  has 
been,'  he  said,  '  a  precious  experience  to  me  that  I  was 
brought  face  to  face  with  death,  and  found  all  was 
well.'  " 

All  was  well  to  him  as  he  neared  the  end  of  his  pil- 
grimage and  approached  the  unseen  world  to  which  his 
mother  had  passed  through  as  terrible  an  affliction  and 
fierce  a  battle  as  that  in  which  he  received  his  last 
wound.  She  escaped  from  her  conflict  and  left  her 
children  broken-hearted  ;  her  son  was  removed  from 
his  great  duties  and  left  millions  of  mourners  and  a 
nation  to  regret  his  death — a  nation  which  will  never 
forget  the  Christian  soldier  "  who  passed  over  the  river 
to  rest  under  the  shade  of  the  trees"  in  the  land  be- 
yond death. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  COWPER. 

There  are  some  men  who  from  early  boyhood  seem 
to  be  peculiarly  sensitive  to  the  moral  and  intellectual 
influence  of  women.  The  gentleness  and  sympathy 
with  which  that  influence  is  accompanied  makes  a 
deeper  and  more  lasting  impression  on  their  heart  than 
the  more  solemn  if  not  sterner  precepts  inculcated  by 
the  father.  Cowper  had  a  nature  of  this  kind,  and 
the  greatest  misfortune  that  could  possibly  have  be- 
fallen his  clinging  and  over-sensitive  mind  was  to  lose 
his  mother,  as  he  did,  at  the  age  of  six. 

Some  have  gone  so  far  as  to  attribute  to  this  loss  all 
his  subsequent  mental  sufferings.  But  such  a  view  is 
inconsistent  with  what  we  know  of  human  nature,  and 
especially  of  the  elasticity  and  recuperative  spirits  of 
children.  Even  of  grown  persons,  what  a  modern  poet 
has  said  is  true,  that 

"  Nothing  is  permanent  with  man. 
For  grief  and  pain  are  transitory  things  not  less  than  joy  ; 
And  though  they  leave  us  not  the  men  we  have  been, 
Yet  they  do  leave  us." 

If  this  remedial  influence  of  time  be  true  of  mature 
grief,  much  more  is  it  so  of  the  early  years,  when 
impressions  are  less  fixed  and  feelings  less  deep-seated. 
That  he  suffered  acutely  in  his  child's  heart  for  her 
loss,  and  that  he  cherished  through  life  the  tenderest 


200  THE   MOTHER   OF   COWPER. 

affection  for  her  memory,  is  proved,  indeed,  by  his 
letters,  as  well  as  by  the  beautiful  poem  which  he  com- 
posed on  receiving  her  picture — the  only  one  extant — 
from  his  cousin,  Mrs.  Bodham.  "  I  have  lately,"  he 
says,  in  a  letter  to  Mrs.  King,  "  received  from  a  female 
cousin  of  mine  residing  in  Norfolk,  whom  I  have  not 
seen  these  five-and-thirty  years,  a  picture  of  my  own 
mother.  She  died  when  I  wanted  two  days  of  being 
six  years  old  ;  yet  I  remember  her  perfectly,  find  the 
picture  a  strong  likeness  of  her,  and  because  her 
memory  has  been  ever  precious  to  me,  have  written  a 
poem  on  the  receipt  of  it  ;  a  poem  which,  one  excepted, 
I  had  more  pleasure  in  writing  than  any  I  ever  wrote. 
That  one  was  addressed  to  a  lady  (Mrs.  Unwin),  whom 
I  expect  in  a  few  minutes  to  come  down  to  brealvfast, 
and  who  has  supplied  to  me  the  place  of  my  own 
mother — my  own  invaluable  mother — these  six-and- 
twenty  years." 

Cowper's  affection  for  Mrs.  Unwin,  which  is  here  ex- 
pressed, and  her  long  solicitude  and  devoted  friendship 
for  him,  illustrate  our  remark  that  his  was  a  nature 
that  was  drawn  by  his  feelings  to  seek  the  consolation 
of  noble  female  friendship  irresistibly.  But  for  Mrs. 
Unwin' s  care,  his  lot  in  later  life  would  have  been  far 
more  desolate  and  gloomy  than  it  was.  In  another 
letter  Cowper  again  speaks  of  the  happiness  his 
mother' s  picture  has  given  him.  "  I  am  delighted, ' '  he 
says,  "  with  Mrs.  Bodham' s  kindness  in  giving  me  the 
only  picture  of  my  mother  that  is  to  be  found,  I  sup- 
pose, in  all  the  world.  I  had  rather  j)ossess  it  than  the 
richest  jewel  in  the  British  crown,  for  I  loved  her  with 
an  affection  that  her  death,  fifty-two  years  since,  hau 


MEMORIES   OF   HIS    MOTHER.  261 

.not  in  the  least  abated.  I  remember  her,  too,  young  as 
I  was  when  she  died,  well  enough  to  know  that  it  is  a 
very  exact  likeness  of  her,  and  as  such  to  me  is  in- 
valuable. Everybody  loved  her,  and  with  an  amiable 
character  so  impressed  upon  her  features,  everybody 
was  sure  to  do  so."  In  thanking  his  cousin  Ann  for 
the  gift,  he  says,  "  Every  creature  that  bears  an  affinity 
to  my  mother  is  dear  to  me  ;  and  you,  the  daughter  of 
her  brother,  are  but  one  remove  distant  from  her.  I 
love  you,  therefore,  and  love  you  much  both  for  her 
sake  and  for  your  own.  The  world  could  not  have 
furnished  you  with  a  present  so  acceptable  to  me  as 
the  picture  you  have  so  kindly  sent  me.  I  received  it 
the  night  before  last,  and  viewed  it  with  a  trepidation 
of  nerves  and  si)irits  akin  to  what  I  should  have  felt 
had  the  dear  original  presented  herself  to  my  embrace. 
I  kissed  it,  and  hang  it  where  it  is  the  last  object  that 
I  see  at  night,  and  of  course  the  first  on  which  I  open 
my  eyes  in  the  morning.  She  died  when  I  completed 
my  sixth  year,  yet  I  remember  her  well,  and  am  an 
ocular  witness  to  the  great  fidelity  of  the  copy.  I  re- 
member, too,  a  multitude  of  the  maternal  kindnesses 
which  I  received  from  her,  and  which  have  endeared 
her  memory  to  me  beyond  exx)ression. ' ' 

This  was  after  the  lapse  of  more  than  half  a  century 
since  his  mother's  death,  and  it  illustrates  the  power 
of  memory  on  the  affections,  which  we  are  generally 
apt  to  undervalue,  but  which,  in  a  nature  as  intellectual 
and  meditative  as  Cowper's,  is  often  as  great  as  the 
power  of  the  living  presence.  The  poem  which  he 
wrote  on  looking  at  the  picture  is  too  long  to  quote 
entire.     It  will  be    found  in  most  large  volumes    of 


262  THE   MOTHER   OF   COWPER. 

selected  poems.  We  take  from  it  tliose  passages  wliick 
seem  to  shed  the  most  vivid  light  upon  the  affectionate 
relations  between  the  mother  and  the  child.  He  recalls 
the  tender  accents  of  her  voice  in  the  opening  lines,  and 
then  the  sweet  smile  that  accompanied  her  words  to 
him. 

"  O  that  those  lips  had  language  !     Life  has  passed 
With  me  but  roughly  since  I  heard  thee  last. 
Those  lips  are  thine — thy  own  sweet  smile  I  see 
The  same  that  oft  in  childhood  solaced  me  ; 
Voice  only  fails,  else  how  distinct  they  say, 
Grieve  not,  my  child  ;  chase  all  thy  fears  away  !" 

For  the  moment  her  presence  seems  about  him  and 
before  his  eyes.  Presently  memory  takes  him  back 
to  the  dark,  sad  hour  of  a  child's  bereavement  and 
loneliness  when  he  realized  that  her  voice  was  hushed 
and  her  sweet  smile  stereotyped  by  death. 

"  My  mother  !  when  I  learned  that  thou  wast  dead, 
Say,  wast  thou  conscious  of  the  tears  I  shed  ? 
I  heard  the  bells  tolled  on  thy  burial  day  ; 
I  saw  the  hearse  that  bore  thee  slowly  away  ; 
And,  turning  from  my  nursery  window,  drew 
A  long,  long  sigh,  and  wept  a  last  adieu  ! 
Thus  many  a  sad  to-morrow  came  and  went. 
Till,  all  my  stock  of  infant  sorrow  spent, 
I  learned  at  last  submission  to  my  lot  ; 
But,  though  I  less  deplore  thee,  ne'er  forgot." 

That  the  child' s  grief  was  intense  we  mav  learn  bv 
his  allusion  to  the  well-meant  assurances  of  the  servants 
that  she  would  soon  return  to  him. 

"Thy  maidens,  grieved  themselves  at  my  concern, 
Oft  gave  me  promise  of  thy  quick  return ; 


POETICAL  ALLUSIONS.  263 

What  ardently  I  wished,  I  long  believed, 
And  disappointed  still,  was  still  deceived. 
By  expectation  every  day  beguiled, 
Dupe  of  to-morrow,  even  from  a  child." 

Mrs.  Cowper,  whom  lier  niece,  Lady  Walsingliam, 
described  on  her  monument  in  Barkhampstead  church, 
of  which  his  father  was  rector,  as  "  the  best  of  mothers 
and  the  kindest  wife,"  was  only  thirty-four  years  of 
age  when  she  died  on  November  13th,  1737. 

The  further  allusions  in  the  poem  give  us  delightful 
rvlimpses  of  the  tender  familiarity  and  playfulness  of 
her  little  son  toward  her.  How  many  other  happy 
children's  lives  does  it  reflect,  the  mother's  protection 
of  her  little  one,  and  she  herself  the  last  vision  at  night 
and  the  first  at  daybreak. 

"  Thy  nightly  visits  to  my  chamber  made, 
That  thou  might'st  know  me  safe  and  warmly  laid  ; 
Thy  morning  bounties,  ere  I  left  my  home, 
The  biscuit  or  confectionery  plum  ; 
The  fragrant  waters  on  my  cheek  bestowed. 
By  thy  own  band,  till  fresh  they  shone  and  glowed." 

He  remembered  even  his  mother's  dress,  how  he 
clung  to  it  and  played  with  it. 

"  Could  Time,  his  flight  reversed,  restore  the  hours. 
When,  playing  with  thy  vesture's  tissued  flowers  ; 
The  violet,  the  pink  and  jessamine, 
I  pricked  them  into  paper  with  a  pin 
(And  thou  wast  happier  than  myself  the  while, 
Would'st  softly  speak,  and  stroke  my  head  and  smile)  ; 
Could  those  few  pleasant  days  again  appear, 
Might  one  wish  bring  them — would  I  wish  them  here  ? 
I  would  not  trust  my  heart,  the  dear  delight 
Seems  so  to  be  de^red. " 


264  THE   MOTHER   OF   COWPER. 

He  recalls  his  first  attendance  at  the  villaoe  dav- 
school,  for  he  was  not  sent  to  boarding-school  until 
after  his  mother's  death. 

.  .  .   "the  gardener  Robin,  day  by  day, 
Drew  me  to  school  along  the  public  way, 
Delighted  with  my  bauble  coach,  and  wrapped 
In  scarlet  mantle  warm,  and  velvet  capped." 

It  does  not  appear  with  any  certainty  from  which  of 
his  parents  Cowper  inherited  his  physical  weakness 
and  his  nervous  or  mental  trouble.  That  it  was  an 
inheritance  there  can  be  little  doubt.  There  was  no 
originating  cause  in  his  own  life,  as  we  may  know  from 
the  fact  that  the  only  one  suggested  by  his  biographers 
is  grief  for  the  death  of  his  mother.  It  is  not  unusual, 
in  the  mysterious  dispensations  of  life,  that  the  same 
beloved  parent  from  whom  a  child  derives  its  choicest 
intellectual  gifts  leaves  it  also  a  heritage  of  woe  in 
some  hereditary  ailment,  physical  or  mental,  and  often 
both.  It  is  probable  that  this  dear  mother  transmitted 
to  her  boy  a  tendency  to  brain  trouble,  of  which 
she  was  herself  unconscious  ;  for  such  insidious  dis- 
eases will  attack  one  generation  and  one  person  while 
they  leave  others  alone.  If  this  be  so,  a  new  light  of 
pathetic  tenderness  is  cast  upon  Cowj^er's  poem  on 
gazing  upon  the  picture  of  lier  who  gave  him  life  with 
all  its  sorrows  as  well  as  its  sublime  affection,  and  who, 
looking  upon  him  from  the  canvas  when  past  the  prime 
of  manhood  and  a  lonely  and  afflicted  man,  rekindles 
the  sweet  memories  of  life's  early  morning  and  in- 
spires him  with  the  Christian's  hoj)e  of  being  reunited 
to   her   in   that    brighter   world   where    there    is    no 


COWPER'S   INHERITANCE.  265 

mental  obscurity,  nor  bodily  sickness,  but  wliere  the 
angels 

.   .  .   "  minister  to  a  mind  diseased, 
Pluck  from  the  memory  a  rooted  sorrow." 

There  was  intellect  and  indeed  genius  in  both 
branches  of  his  parental  stock.  His  mother,  whose 
maiden  name  was  Anne  Donne,  daughter  of  Roger 
Donne,  of  Ludham,  was  descended  from  the  famous 
satirist  and  divine,  Dr.  Donne,  Dean  of  St.  Paul's, 
whose  poems  and  sermons  are  read  with  admiration 
even  in  our  own  day.  His  father  was  one  of  the  chap- 
lains  of  King  George  the  Second,  and  came  of  a  very 
ancient  and  noted  family.  We  must  not  wholly  dis- 
connect Cowper's  physical  and  mental  maladies.  He 
had  to  be  taken  from  his  first  school  for  a  distemper 
of  the  eyes,  which  at  one  time  threatened  total  blind- 
ness. Like  Alexander  Pope,  Samuel  Johnson,  and 
other  men  of  genius,  he  inherited  bodily  disease. 
Such  affections  are  often  allied  to  nervous  irritability, 
melancholia,  and  religious  despondency.  They  are, 
like  St.  Paul's  "  thorn  in  the  flesh,"  a  constant 
irritant  to  the  nervous  system,  and  clog  to  the  freedom 
of  the  spirit. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  GOETHE. 


The  motlier  of  Goethe,  like  tlie  mother  of  the  first 
Napoleon,  was  only  eighteen  when  he  was  born.  At 
seventeen  she  had  married  a  man  whom  she  did  not 
love,  from  that  sx)irit  of  filial  obedience  which  is  so 
i:)ecu]iarly  German.  Goethe  inherited  many  peculiari- 
ties of  his  cold  and  methodical  father's  character.  -He 
is  described  by  those  who  knew  him  as  an  honorable 
and  truthful  man,  imperious  and  capricious  in  the 
government  of  his  household,  with  a  pedantic  love  for 
curious  knowledge,  and  some  eagerness  in  imparting  it 
to  others.  He  was  distinctly  the  respectable  citizen, 
and  if  he  did  not  win  the  love  of  others,  including  his 
young  wife,  he  deserved  and  won  their  respect.  His 
son  inherited  his  method  and  order,  as  he  did  his  erect 
figure  and  measured  gait.  But  his  genius  was  his  own 
by  inherited  right.  His  father  could  not  bequeath  it 
to  him,  for  he  did  not  possess  it  himself. 

Neither  can  it  be  said  from  the  evidence  of  her  letters 
that  Goethe's  mother  was  a  woman  of  genius.  Some 
of  them  are  quite  commonplace  and  trivial,  and  she 
sometimes  descends  to  platitudes,  and  what  would  now 
be  called  cant,  especially  when  stringing  Scripture 
texts  not  very  relevantly  together  under  some  recent 
bereavement.  There  are  hundreds  of  women  who  have 
no  such  son  as  Goethe,  who  write  far  better  letters  with 
far  brighter  and  more  original  ideas  in   them   than 


INHERITANCE   FROM   HIS   MOTHER,  267 

Goethe's  motlier.  But  the  laws  that  seem  to  govern 
the  transmission  of  intellectual  and  moral  qualities  do 
not  warrant  us  in  expecting  in  the  parent  the  devel- 
oped inspiration  that  we  often  find  in  the  offspring. 
It  is  safe  to  say  that  one  or  other  of  Shakespeare's 
parents  must  have  had  in  germ,  although  probably 
hidden  under  a  bushel  of  rustic  ignorance  and  practical 
labor  for  daily  bread,  some  at  least  of  those  vast  and 
universal  qualities  and  thoughts  which  made  him  the 
myriad-minded  proj^het  and  poet  of  all  time.  So  in 
the  intellectual  make-uj)  of  Goethe,  whom  the  greatest 
of  modern  English  statesmen,  William  Ewart  Glad- 
stone, declares  to  have  taught  him  deeper  and  truer 
and  more  valuable  life-lore  than  all  other  authors,  we 
may  be  certain  that  the  germ  of  his  great  genius  was 
latent  in  one  or  other  of  his  parents,  or  in  both. 
Without  depreciating  the  valuable  habits  of  precision 
and  order  and  the  love  of  learning  which  he  derived 
from  his  father,  there  can  be  no  question  that  it  was 
the  mother  who  set  the  wheels  of  his  imagination  in 
motion,  and  that  he  inherited  from  her  little  store  of 
quick  observation,  vivacity,  good-humor  and  youth- 
fulness,  the  wit  and  elasticity  of  feeling  that  illumine 
and  pervade  his  writings. 

If  Goethe's  mother  was  not  the  very  ideal  in  all  re- 
spects of  what  we  should  imagine  the  mother  of  such  a 
genius  to  have  been,  yet,  as  George  Henry  Lewes,  the 
best  of  Goethe's  biographers  and  the  most  appreciative 
of  his  critics,  assures  us,  she  was  "  more  like"  what  we 
conceive  as  the  proper  parent  for  a  poet  than  her  hus- 
band and  his  father  was.  Indeed,  Mr.  Lewes  takes, 
perhaps,  a  more  admiring  view  of  her  than  her  letters 


268  THE  MOTHER  OF  GOETHE. 

justify.  He  says  that  "  she  is  one  of  the  pleasantest 
figures  in  German  literature,  and  one  standing  out 
with  greater  vividness  than  almost  any  other.  Her 
simple,  hearty,  joyous  and  affectionate  nature  en- 
deared her  to  all.  She  was  the  delight  of  children,  the 
favorite  of  jDoets  and  princes.  To  the  last  retaining  her 
enthusiasm  and  simplicity,  mingled  with  great  shrewd- 
ness and  knowledge  of  character,  Fran  Aja,  as  they 
christened  her,  was  at  once  grave  and  hearty,  dignified 
and  simple."  Although  her  culture  was  not  very  deep 
nor  very  extensive,  yet  she  had  made  herself  ac- 
quainted with  the  best  books  in  German  and  Italian  ; 
and  when  the  vivacity  and  thoroughgoing  healthy 
mental  vitality  which  she  shows  in  her  correspondence 
are  considered,  one  can  well  understand  the  remark  an 
admiring  and  sympathetic  writer  made  after  an  inter- 
view with  her :  "  ISTow  I  understand  how  Goethe  has 
become  the  man  he  is." 

The  relations  which  they  bore  to  each  other,  indeed- 
owing  to  her  being  little  more  than  a  child  when  she 
became  his  mother — were  rather  those  of  playmates,  or 
older  sister  and  little  brother,  than  of  mother  and 
child.  "I  and  my  Wolfgang,"  she  said,  "have  al- 
ways held  fast  to  each  other,  because  we  were  young 
together. ' ' 

It  was  thus  that,  as  Mr.  Lewes  says,  "  one  of  the 
kindliest  of  men  inherited  his  loving,  happy  nature 
from  one  of  the  heartiest  of  women."  "Hearty"  is 
just  the  word  to  describe  Katherine  Elizabeth  Goethe, 
who,  as  the  town  clock  of  Frankfort-on-Main  struck 
the  hour  of  noon,  on  the  28th  day  of  August,  1749, 
gave  birth  to  Joliann  AYolfgang  Goethe.     One  of  his 


GOETHES    MOTHER. 


A   MUTUAL  PASTIME.  271 

biographers,  Yiclioff,  says  :  "  All  the  freshness,  the 
wit,  and  the  humor  we  find  in  Groethe,  all  the  depth  of 
feeling  and  the  poetry,  were  foreshadowed  in  his 
mother's  character."  This  is  a  just  description,  and 
accords  with  our  view  expressed  above,  that  only  the 
germ  and  seed,  not  the  flowers  and  fruits,  of  genius 
were  in  the  mother  of  this  marvellous  boy. 

Goethe  himself  has  told  us  that  he  learned  from  his 
mother  the  love  of  stories  and  poems  that  appealed  to 
the  imagination.  She  herself  has  given  in  prose  a 
more  particular  account  of  this  mutual  pastime. 
"Air,  fire,  earth,  and  water  I  represented  under  the 
forms  of  princesses  ;  and  to  all  natural  phenomena  I 
gave  a  meaning,  in  which  I  almost  believed  more  fer- 
vently than  my  little  hearers.  As  we  thought  of 
paths  which  led  from  star  to  star,  and  that  we  should 
one  day  inhabit  the  stars,  and  thought  of  the  great 
spirits  we  should  meet  there,  I  was  as  eager  for  the 
hours  of  story-telling  as  the  children  themselves  ;  I 
was  quite  curious  about  the  future  course  of  my  own 
improvisation,  and  any  invitation  which  interrupted 
these  evenings  was  disagreeable.  There  I  sat,  and 
there  Wolfgang  held  me  in  his  large  black  eyes  ;  and 
when  the  fate  of  one  of  his  favorites  was  not  according 
to  his  fancy,  I  saw  the  angry  veins  swell  on  his  tem- 
ples, I  saw  him  repress  his  tears.  He  often  broke  in 
with,  '  But,  mother,  the  princess  won't  marry  the 
nasty  sailor,  even  if  he  does  kill  the  giant.'  And 
when  I  made  a  pause  for  the  night,  i^romising  to  con- 
tinue it  on  the  morrow,  I  was  certain  that  he  would  in 
the  mean  time  think  it  out  for  himself,  and  he  often 
stimulated  my  imagination.     When  I  turned  the  story 


372  THE  MOTHER  OF  GOETHE. 

according  to  his  plan,  and  told  liim  that  he  had  found 
out  the  denouement^  then  he  was  all  fire  and  flame,  and 
we  could  see  his  heart  beating  underneath  his  dress  ! 
His  grandmother,  who  made  a  great  pet  of  him,  was 
the  confidante  of  all  his  ideas  as  to  how  the  story 
would  turn  out ;  and  as  she  repeated  these  to  me,  and 
I  turned  the  story  according  to  these  hints,  there  was  a 
little  diplomatic  secrecy  between  us  which  we  never 
disclosed.  I  had  the  pleasure  of  continuing  my  story 
to  the  delight  and  astonishment  of  my  hearers,  and 
Wolfgang  saw  with  glowing  eyes  the  fulfilment  of  his 
own  conceptions,  and  listened  with  enthusiastic  ap- 
plause. " 

Through  this  story-telling,  and  even  the  harmless 
deception  practised  through  the  intervention  of  the  be- 
loved grandmother  as  mutual  confidante,  the  mother 
exercised  a  very  powerful  effect  in  stimulating  the 
original  genius  of  the  youthful  auditor.  The  fairy 
tales  of  the  nursery  bear  an  indelible  imj^ression. 
Aged  authors  and  statesmen  recall  at  fourscore  the 
feelings  of  delight  with  which  they  first  read  or  heard 
the  "  Arabian  Nights"  and  "  Robinson  Crusoe."  No 
gift  of  nurse,  mother,  or  sister  is  more  valuable  and  at 
the  same  time  more  rare  than  that  of  a  good  raconteur 
of  children' s  stories,  or  an  original  inventor  of  them. 
We  can  weave  the  plot  as  she  goes  on.  The  imagina- 
tion, which  includes  the  exercise  of  reason,  as  in  the 
tracing  of  cause  and  effect,  the  conjecture  of  the  out- 
come of  complex  circumstances,  the  moral  judgments 
which  the  youthful  listener  passes  upon  the  several 
characters,  and  the  anticipation  of  the  ultimate  result, 
is  the  faculty  which  more  than  any  other  divides  man 


THE   IMAGINATIVE   FACULTY.  273 

from  the  beast.  The  horse,  the  dog,  and  the  elephant, 
and  some  others  of  the  lower  orders  of  sentient  creat- 
ures, no  doubt  possess  an  infinitesimal  or  initiatory 
germ  of  this  fjiculty.  But  with  man  it  is  the  supreme 
source  of  intelligence,  hapi3iness,  and  morality.  The 
chambers  of  imagination  are  none  other  than  the  house 
of  God  and  the  gate  of  Heaven.  The  late  Lord  Bea- 
consfield  declared  that  lack  of  imagination  was  the 
chief  cause  of  suicide.  Perhaps  an  excess  or  distortion 
of  it  is  quite  as  frequently  so.  But  as  a  lightener  of 
physical  and  worldly  burdens  ;  as  the  fount  and  origin 
of  hope — for  it  has  no  other ;  as  the  sunshine  that 
lights  the  dark  corners  and  broken  windows  of  this 
hard,  suffering  life  of  ours,  and  bids  us  look  onward 
and  upward  to  the  distant  mountains  of  deliverance 
and  freedom — imagination  is  heaven's  greatest  gift  to 
man,  the  magic  wand  which  can  bring  "water  from 
the  rock,  and  honey  out  of  the  stony  rock,"  and 
which  alone  can  "  make  the  wilderness  to  blossom  as 
the  rose."  Take  away  Shakespeare's  imagination,  and 
there  is  no  Shakespeare.  Take  away  Goethe's  imagina- 
tion, and  there  is  no  Goethe. 

If  this  be  true,  as  it  unquestionably  is,  how  awful  is 
the  responsibility  of  parents  in  choosing  the  early 
.  choir  leaders,  so  to  speak,  of  the  nursery,  those  whose 
Homeric  songs  and  stories,  like  those  of  the  old  trouba- 
dours, awaken  the  responsive  echoes  from  the  hearts  of 
children.  A  vicious  or  feeble  imagination  in  the  storv- 
teller  of  the  nursery  is  perhaps  worse  than  none  at  all, 
because  the  impressions  it  leaves  on  the  white  surface  of 
the  young  child's  mind  do  not  tend  to  educate,  but  to 
pervert  and  embarrass  the  right  ascension  of  this  noble 


274  THE  MOTHER  OF  GOETHE. 

faculty.  Nursery  rhymes,  with  their  hideous  jingle 
and  senseless  Jargon,  and  nursery  stories,  with  their 
fabulous  instead  of  parabolic  element,  are  a  hindrance, 
not  a  help  to  the  healthy  growth  of  imagination  in 
children. 

Goethe's  mother  possessed  the  great  gift  of  story- 
telling and  i^lot-weaving  in  a  remarkable  degree.  Her 
own  perceptions  were  as  quick  as  intuitions,  and  her 
own  nature  was  full  of  sunshine,  kindness,  and  the 
enthusiasm  of  humanity.  Her  own  words  describe  her 
better  than  any  analysis  which  could  be  made  by 
others.  "I  am  fond  of  people,''  she  wi'ites,  "and 
that  every  one  feels  directly,  young  and  old.  I  pass 
without  pretension  through  the  world,  and  that  grati- 
fies men.  I  never  hemorallze  any  one,  always  seek  out 
the  good  that  is  in  them,  and  leave  what  is  bad  to  Him 
who  made  mankind,  and  knows  how  to  round  off  the 
angles.  In  this  way  I  make  myself  happy  and  com- 
fortable." "  Order  and  quiet,"  she  says  in  one  of  her 
letters  to  Freiherr  von  Stein,  "  are  my  principal  char- 
acteristics. Hence  I  despatch  at  once  whatever  I  have 
to  do,  the  most  disagreeable  always  first,  and  I  gulp 
down  the  devil  without  looking  at  him.  When  all  has 
returned  to  its  proper  state,  then  I  defy  any  one  to 
surpass  me  in  good  humor." 

No  doubt  a  robust  constitution  and  a  naturally  ex- 
uberant flow  of  animal  spirits  made  Frau  Rath,  or 
Fran  Aja,  as  she  was  called,  the  good-humored  and 
magnetic  woman  that  she  was.  Not  only,  as  Groethe 
writes,  did  he  inherit 

"Von  Miitterchen  die  Frohnatur, 
Die  Lust  zu  fabuliren"— 


A   CLEVER   WOMAN.  275 

"  From  mother  dear  the  frolic  soul, 
The  love  of  spinning  fiction" — 

but  that  radiant  sense  of  happiness  and  contentment 
which  sparkles  in  all  his  life.  Her  picture,  or  rather 
bust,  gives  us  a  good  idea  of  the  jovial,  intellectual, 
life-enjoying  housewife,  who  picked  up  all  she  knew 
from  insight  and  experience  of  men  and  things,  not 
from  regular  study.  She  disclaimed  for  herself  all 
literary  pretensions.  "  I  have  never  written  even  an 
ABC  book,"  she  says,  in  a  letter  to  her  son,  "and 
my  genius  will  in  future  guard  me  against  any  possi- 
bility of  the  sort."  In  another  place  she  trusts  that 
•'  the  good  God  will  not  think  me  so  low  that  T 
should  reach  the  depth  of  keeping  a  journal.  Forbid 
it,  Heaven  !" 

That  Frau  Rath  Goethe  was  not  an  ordinary  clever 
woman  is  proved  by  the  affection  for  herself  with 
which  she  inspired  persons  of  every  variety  of  occupa- 
tion and  talent  and  difference  of  worldly  rank.  It  ap- 
pears also  from  the  terms  of  playful  endearment  with 
which  she  is  addressed  by  them,  as  well  as  by  the 
familiar  footing  on  which  she  stands  with  them.  The 
Grand  Duchess  of  Saxe- Weimar,  the  Princess  Anna 
Amalia,  was  her  frequent  correspondent,  and  it  is 
amusing  to  contrast  the  freedom  and  ease  of  the  body 
of  Frau  Rath's  letters  with  the  German  deference  to 
rank  with  which  they  invariably  close.  There  is 
some  doubt  as  to  the  origin  of  her  sobriquet  of  Frau 
Aja.  Goethe  himself  does  not  clearly  explain  it,  neither 
do  her  own  letters.  Its  inward  meaning  is  always  taken 
for  granted.  Diintzer  explains  it  as  having  been  sug- 
gested  at  a  dinner-party   by   the   recollection  of  the 


276  THE  MOTHER  OF  GOETHE. 

legend  of  the  children  of  Haimon,  and  conferred  on 
Fran  Rath  because  she  went  down  to  the  cellar  to  fetch 
wine  for  the  Counts  Stolberg  who  were  dining  with  her 
son.  Those  romantic  young  noblemen  at  once  recalled 
the  similar  scene  in  the  Haimons kinder,  where  their 
mother,  Frau  Aja,  brings  wine  from  the  cellar  for  her 
sons,  who  have  returned  to  the  castle  in  disguise. 
They  greeted  Frau  Rath,  as  she  brought  them  the  good 
cheer,  by  the  name  of  the  good  mother  in  the  legend. 

Herr  Rath  Goethe,  her  husband,  died  in  1782,  and 
Goethe's  mother  was  free  to  choose  her  own  mode  of 
daily  life.  In  a  letter  written  in  March,  1783,  to  the 
Grand  Duchess  of  Saxe- Weimar,  she  thus  describes  it : 

"  In  the  morning  I  attend  to  my  little  housekeei^ing 
and  other  business  matters,  and  then  my  letters  get 
themselves  written.  No  one  ever  had  such  a  droll  cor- 
respondence. Every  month  I  clear  my  desk  out,  and 
I  never  can  do  so  without  laughing.  Inside  the  scene 
is  that  of  heaven — all  class  distinctions  done  away 
with,  and  high  and  low,  saints,  publicans,  and  sinners, 
in  a  heap  together  !  A  letter  from  the  pious  Lavater 
lies  without  animosity  by  the  side  of  one  from  the 
actor  Grossmann.  In  the  afternoon  my  friends  have 
the  right  to  visit  me  ;  but  they  all  have  to  clear  out  by 
four  o'clock,  for  then  I  dress  myself  and  either  go  to 
the  play  or  else  pay  calls.  At  nine  I  am  back  again 
home." 

In  the  earlier  days  of  her  widowhood  she  writes  to 
the  same'  great  friend  : 

"  All  future  Joys  must  be  sought  for  among  strangers 
and  out  of  my  own  house,  for  there  all  is  still  and 
vacant  as  in  the  churchyard.      It  was  far  otherwise 


LETTERS  FROM  FRAU  RATH.         277 

once  !  But  since  tliroiigliout  nature  notliing  remains 
in  its  own  place,  but  whirls  into  the  eternal  rolling  cir- 
cle, how  can  I  suppose  that  I  am  to  be  an  exception  ? 
Frau  Aja  exx)ects  nothing  so  absurd.  Who  would  dis- 
tress himself  because  it  is  not  always  or  because  the 
sun  now  (in  October)  is  not  so  warm  as  in  July  ?  If  the 
present  is  only  well  used,  and  no  thoughts  entertained 
of  how  things  might  be  otherwise,  one  gets  fairly 
through  the  world,  and  the  getting  through  it  is — all 
said  and  done — the  main  thing."  She  seems  resolved 
on  her  own  account  to  get  through  life  pleasantly 
enough,  for  she  adds  :  "  Herr  Tabor  (your  Highness 
will  remember  the  name  at  least)  has  provided  sj)len- 
didly  for  our  amusement.  The  whole  winter  we  are  to 
have  the  play  !  Won't  there  just  be  fiddling  and 
trumpeting  !  Ha  !  I  should  like  to  see  the  evil  spirit 
who  dare  trouble  me  with  melancholy  I  Just  one  Sir 
John  Falstaff  would  put  him  to  the  rout.  We  had  such 
a  gaudium  with  the  old  dog." 

This  Latin  word  frequently  occurs  in  her  letters,  as 
do  such  other  phrases  used  with  mock  solemnity,  ' '  per 
secula  seculorum,''''  '■''lirum  larum^^''  '■'- summa  sum- 
maruiTi,'^''  etc.  Merck,  the  poet,  had  stayed  some 
days  with  her,  and  had  written  a  letter  to  his  and  her 
friend  Wieland  which  he  forgot  to  post.  This  occa- 
sioned a  characteristic  letter  to  Wieland  from  herself  : 

"Dear  Son  :  Merck  was  three  days  with  us.  When 
he  was  gone  I  searched  in  his  room  and  cleared  it  out, 
which  in  the  case  of  poets  is  a  very  necessary  task,  as 
you  can  sufficiently  judge  by  the  letter  which  preceded 
this.     For  that  poor  letter  would  have  lain  where  it 


278  THE  MOTHER  OF  GOETHE. 

was,  and  never  have  readied  its  place  and  destination, 
had  Fran  Aja  had  less  insight  into  the  poet  nature. 
But,  thank  God,  she  is  not  yet  out  of  practice,  though 
for  these  three  years  Herr  Wolfgang  Goethe  has  no 
longer  gladdened  her  house,  but  allowed  the  light  of 
his  countenance  to  shine  at  Weimar." 

Frau  Rath,  always  the  trusted  friend  and  confidante 
of  the  young,  wi^ote  some  charming  letters  to  Friedrich 
von  Stein,  then  a  lad  of  eleven,  who  subsequently  cor- 
responded with  Goethe  himself.  In  one  of  her  letters 
she  sends  him  two  silhouettes  of  herself,  and  says  : 

' '  In  person  I  am  reasonably  taU  and  reasonably 
stout ;  have  brown  hair  and  eyes,  and  could  represent 
tolerably  well  the  mother  of  Prince  Hamlet.  Many 
persons — among  them  the  Princess  of  Dessau — declare 
there  could  be  no  mistake  about  Goethe  being  my  son. 
I  do  not  find  it  so,  but  there  must  be  something  in  it. 
it  has  been  said  so  often." 

Indeed,  the  good  and  gleeful  mother  never  fails  to 
think  with  pride  of  the  genius  and  fame  of  her  wonder- 
ful boy,  Johann  Wolfgang  Goethe,  whom  she  lived  to 
see  the  greatest  man  in  Germany.  Friiulein  von  Goch- 
hausen,  famous  for  her  wit  and  her  deformity,  who  was 
lady-in-waiting  to  the  Grand  Duchess  Anna  Amalia  of 
Weimar,  was  fond  of  writing  what  is  called  in  Germany 
"  knuttel-vers,"  or  what  we  should  call  nonsense- 
verses  or  doggerel.  She  often  wrote  in  this  rhyming 
mood  her  letters  to  Frau  Rath,  and  the  latter  replied 
in  the  same  dialect.  « 

"  In  Versemachcn  habe  nicht  viel  gethan, 
Das  sieht  man  diesen  wahrlich  an, 


A   SKATING   SCENE.  279 

Doch  habe  ich  geboren  eiii  Knabeleiu  aclion, 
Das  thut  das  alles  gar  trefilich  verstehn." 

"  No  great  things  have  I  done  in  rhyme, 
As  you  may  judge  at  any  time  ; 
But  I  a  handsome  lad  can  claim, 
"Who  knows  full  well  the  tuneful  game." 

Of  the  pride  she  took  in  him,  the  following  anecdote 
of  his  boyhood,  as  told  by  herself,  is  proof  : 

''  The  morning  was  bright  and  frosty.  Wolfgang 
burst  into  the  room  where  I  was  seated  with  some 
friends.  '  Mother,  you  have  never  seen  me  skate,  and 
the  weather  is  so  beautiful  to-day. '  I  put  on  my  crim- 
son fur  cloak,  wliich  had  a  long  train  and  was  closed 
in  front  by  golden  clasps,  and  we  drove  out.  There 
skated  my  son,  like  an  arrow  among  the  groups.  The 
wind  had  reddened  his  cheeks  and  blown  the  powder 
out  of  his  brown  hair.  When  he  saw  my  crimson 
cloak,  he  came  toward  our  carriage,  and  smiled  coax- 
ingly  at  me.  'Well,'  said  I,  'what  do  you  want  T 
'  Come,  mother  ;  you  can't  be  cold  in  the  carriage  ;  give 
me  your  cloak.'  '  You  won't  put  it  on,  w^ill  you  ? ' 
'  Certainly.'  I  took  it  off  ;  he  put  it  on,  threw  the 
train  over  his  arm,  and  away  he  went  over  the  ice  like 
a  son  of  the  gods.  Oh,  Bettina,  if  you  could  have  seen 
him  !  Anything  so  beautiful  is  not  to  be  seen  now  ! 
I  clapped  my  hands  for  joy.  ISTever  shall  I  forget  him, 
as  he  darted  out  from  under  one  arch  of  the  bridge,  and 
in  again  under  the  other,  the  wind  carrying  the  train 
behind  him  as  he  flew." 

How  deep  and  tender  was  the  natural  affection  of 
Goethe  himself  while  yet  a  child,  the  following  brief 


280  THE  MOTHER  OF  GOETHE. 

anecdote  will  serve  to  show.  The  small-pox  had 
carried  off  his  little  brother  Jacob.  To  the  surprise  of 
his  mother,  Johann  Wolfgang  did  not  shed  a  tear,  for 
he  believed  with  a  young  heart's  trust  that  God  had 
taken  little  Jacob  to  dwell  with  Him  in  heaven.  His 
mother,  not  understanding  the  cause  of  his  equanimity, 
asked  him,  "  Did  you  not  love  your  little  brother, 
then,  that  you  do  not  grieve  for  his  loss  ?"  He  ran  up 
to  his  room,  and  from  under  the  bed  drew  a  quantity 
of  paper  on  which  he  had  wTitten  stories  and  lessons. 
"All  these  I  had  written,"  he  said  to  his  mother, 
"  that  I  might  teach  them  to  little  Jacob."  He  was 
then  only  nine  years  old. 

Although  Frau  Rath  Goethe  could  not  be  2:)ersuaded 
even  by  her  son  to  leave  her  native  Frankfort-on-the- 
Main  and  take  up  her  abode  with  him  in  Weimar,  their 
love  for  each  other  was  never  broken.  In  August, 
1797,  he  took  his  wife  Christiane  Yulpries  and  their 
son  August  to  visit  her.  And  when  on  one  occasion  in 
later  life  he  found  an  old  letter  from  his  mother,  he 
said,  "  It  reminded  me  in  a  strange  manner  of  many 
peaceful  passages  of  my  youth,  and  circumstances  con- 
nected with  my  family  and  native  town.  ...  I  was 
taken  by  surprise  and  thrown  back  upon  myself  ;  a 
thousand  images  started  up  before  me.  ...  As  a  sick 
person  or  prisoner  forgets  for  the  moment  his  pains  and 
troubles,  while  listening  to  some  tale  that  is  being 
related  to  him,  so  was  I  also  carried  back  to  other 
spheres  and  other  times." 

Among  the  peculiarities  of  Goethe' s  highly  sensitive 
nature  was  one  which  he  distinctly  inherited  from  his 
mother,  the  shrinking  from  painful  and  affecting  scenes, 


A   SUNNY  NATURE.  281 

spectacles,  and  conversations.    Her  letters  abound  with 
expressions  of  the  desire  to  get  along  pleasantly  and 
jovially  to  the  end  of  life.     Only  now  and  then  to 
Lavater,  the  x>rophet    and    iDhysiognomist,  does    she 
express  a  sense  of  the  awful  sorrows  and  chastenings 
of  life.     Her  nature  shrinks  from  the  contemplation  of 
the  trials  and  sufferings  of  others.     Even  on  the  death 
of  her  daughter  Cornelia,   her  meditation  is   chiefly 
introspective,  and  she  cries  in  pity  for  her  own  feelings 
as  a  mother,  "  Oh,  dear  Lavater  !  the  poor  mother  had 
much,  much  to  bear."     So  Falk  relates  that  w^hen 
Goethe  heard  that  he  had  looked  upon  Wieland  in 
death,  and  "  thereby  procured  myself  a  miserable  even- 
ing and  worse  night,  he  vehemently  reproved  me  for 
it."     "  Why,"  said  he,  "  should  I  suffer  the  delightful 
impression  of  the  features  of  my  friend  to  be  obliterated 
by  the  sight  of  a  disfigured  mask  ?     I  carefully  avoided 
seeing  Schiller,  Herder,  or  the  Duchess  Amalia  in  the 
coffin.     I,  for  my  part,  desired  to  retain  in  my  memory 
a  picture  of  my  departed  friends  more  full  of  soul  than 
the  mere  mask  can  furnish  me."     But  neither  in  the 
mother  nor  the  son  did  this  repugnance  to  painful  scenes 
and  memories  arise  from  want  of  heart,  but  rather  from 
an  excess  of  sensitive  affection. 

Those  who  had  known  Goethe' s  mother  never  forgot 
or  ceased  to  love  her.  '  •'  How  did  we  hang  upon  her 
lips,"  says  one,  "  when  in  her  joyous  yet  earnest  man- 
ner she  related  to  us,  then  girls  of  twelve  or  fourteen, 
a  story  by  Wieland,  or  recited  a  poem  by  her  son  ! 
How  intense  was  her  attachment  to  her  friends  !  How 
efficient  a  mediator  and  helper,  how  faithful  and  dis- 
creet a  confidante  was  she  !"     "  How  many  hours  of 


282  THE  MOTHER  OF  GOETHE. 

intimacy,"  says  another,  "have  I  passed  with  her 
nailed  to  my  chair,  listening  to  stories  !" 

Frau  Rath  herself  has  vividly  described  her  Satur- 
day evening  cu'cle  of  listeners.  To  one  of  them, 
Crespel,  during  his  temporary  absence  from  Franlvfort, 
she  writes  :  "  Yesterday  would  have  been  a  great  pleas- 
ure to  you.  A  thousand  pities  that  you  are  sitting  in 
Ratisbon  !  Eight  young  maidens  were  mth  me.  We 
played  '  Stirbt  der  Fuchs  so  gilt  sein  Balz '  ('  When 
the  fox  dies  his  skin  counts  ' ),  and  that  brought  forfeits 
and  made  much  merriment.  Then  there  were  stories 
told  and  enigmas  given  ;  in  one  word,  there  was  great 
fun.     All  wished  that  j^ou  were  back  again." 

The  game  referred  to  derived  its  name  from  Goethe's 
song  with  that  title.  It  is  also  known  as  "  Jack's 
Alight,"  or  "  Bonhomme  vit  Encore,"  and  consists  in 
passing  a  lighted  stick  rapidly  from  hand  to  hand,  the 
one  in  whose  hand  it  goes  out  paying  a  forfeit.  In 
those  vivacious  years  the  good  Frau  Rath  loved  also  to 
sing  her  son's  song  of  "  The  King  and  his  Flea,"  and 
the  guests  who  drank  her  choice  old  wine  joined  in  the 
chorus.  But  as  the  shadows  of  old  age  gathered 
around  her,  her  spirits  became  more  subdued,  tran- 
quillized by  a  deep  trust  in  God. 

Dr.  Robert  Keif,  writing  of  Frau  Rath,  tells  a  pathetic 
story.  "When  Goethe,  in  'Wilhelm  Meister,'  had 
thrown  the  letters  and  conversations  of  Friiulein  von 
Klettenberg  into  the  foam  of  the  Bekenntnisse  einer 
schlinen  Seele,  the  Frau  Rath  copied  with  her  own 
hand  for  her  son,  from  the  TheologiscJie  Annalen,  a  re- 
view of  those  pages,  and  added  the  following  words  : 
^"  My  criterion  is  Psalm  1:3,'  His  leaf  also  shall  not 


DEATH  OF  FRAU  RATH.  283 


wither.'  It  certainly  did  not  occur  to  my  dear  Kletten- 
berg  that  after  so  long  a  time  her  memory  should  still 
grow  green  and  blossom  and  bring  blessings  to  after 
generations.  Thou,  my  dear  son,  wast  destined  by 
Providence  for  the  preservation  and  dissemination  of 
these  unfading  leaves.  God's  blessing  and  a  thousand 
thanks  for  it !  And  as  it  is  clearly  to  be  seen  from  this 
narrative  that  no  good  seed  is  lost,  but  bears  fruit  in  its 
season,  let  us  not  be  weary  in  well-doing,  for  the  har- 
vest will  reward  us  with  full  barns." 

Frau  Rath's  death  was  somewhat  sudden,  and 
occurred  on  the  13th  of  September,  1808,  when  she  was 
seventy-seven  years  old.  Her  faithful  servant  Lischen 
was  with  her  at  the  last.  Death  did  not  take  her  by 
surprise,  for  she  had  j)rearranged  all  the  details  of  her 
funeral,  even  to  the  wine  and  biscuits  for  the  mourners. 
She  was  buried  in  the  old  Frankfort  Friedhof,  where 
her  gravestone  was  erected  some  years  later. 

We  cannot  conclude  this  sketch  of  her,  derived  from 
her  own  letters  and  several  indei)endent  sources  as  to 
its  incidents  and  general  characteristics,  better  than  in 
the  words  of  Gr.  H.  Lewes  :  "  To  the  last  her  love  for 
her  son,  and  his  for  her,  had  been  the  glory  and  sus- 
tainment  of  her  happy  old  age." 


THE  MOTHER  OF  THE  NAPIERS. 

*'  This  shall  be  the  story  of  a  man,"  says  Lieutenant 
Sir  William  Napier,  at  the  opening  of  his  "  Life  and 
Opinions  of  General  Sir  Charles  James  Napier,"  his 
brother,  who  "  never  tarnished  his  reputation  by  a 
shameful  deed  ;  of  one  who  subdued  distant  nations 
by  his  valor,  and  then  governed  them  so  wisely  that 
English  rule  was  reverenced  and  loved  where  before  it 
had  been  feared  and  execrated.  For  thus  nobly  acting, 
the  virulence  of  interested  faction  was  loosed  to  do  him 
wrong  ;  honors  were  withheld,  and  efforts  made  to 
depreciate  his  exploits  by  successive  governments; 
nevertheless  his  fame  has  been  accepted  by  the  British 
people  as  belonging  to  the  glory  of  the  nation." 

The  fame  of  Sir  Charles  Napier  is  indeed  well  pub- 
lished the  world  over,  and  scarcely  less  famous  was  the 
Napier  who  wrote  his  life,  his  younger  brother,  who 
with  an  elder  brother,  George,  formed  a  triumvirate  of 
military  heroes  such  as  the  world  has  rarely  seen.  It 
is  natural  for  the  student  of  modern  history  to  ask  who 
were  the  i)arents  of  such  men,  and  especially  who  was 
their  mother.  The  positive  records  regarding  her  are 
few,  but  they  are  the  more  suggestive  and  interesting 
from  their  incompleteness. 

Lady  Sarah  Lennox,  the  mother  of  the  Napiers,  was 
daughter  of  the  second  Duke  of  Riclimond,  who  was  a 
grandson  of  Charles  the  Second,   and  married  Lady 


A   STRANGE   WEDDING.  285 

Sarali  Cadogan,  whose  father  was  the  favorite  general 
of  the  famous  Duke  of  Marlborough.  It  seems  almost 
incredible  to  our  nineteenth  century  civilization  that 
the  marriage  of  this  nobleman  when  Lord  March,  dur- 
ing his  father's  lifetime,  and  a  mere  youth  at  college, 
should  have  been  a  bargain  to  cancel  a  gambling  debt 
which  his  father  was  unable  to  meet.  "  The  young 
Lord  March,"  writes  Sir  William  Napier,  "  was 
brought  from  college,  the  lady  from  the  nursery,  for 
the  ceremony.  The  bride  was  amazed  and  silent,  but 
the  bridegroom  exclaimed,  '  Surely  you  are  not  going 
to  marry  me  to  that  dowdy  ? '  Married  he  was,  how- 
ever, and  his  tutor  instantly  carried  him  off  to  the  con- 
tinent. Lady  Sarah  went  back  to  her  mother,  a 
daughter  of  Wilhelm  Munter,  States  Councillor  of 
Holland. 

"  Three  years  afterward  Lord  March  returned  from 
his  travels,  an  accomx^lished  gentleman,  but  having 
such  a  disagreeable  recollection  of  his  wife  that  he 
avoided  home,  and  repaii^ed  on  the  first  night  of  his 
arrival  to  the  theatre.  There  he  saw  a  lady  of  so  fine 
appearance  that  he  asked  who  she  was.  '  The  reign- 
ing toast,  the  beautiful  Lady  March.'  He  hastened  to 
claim  her,  and  they  lived  together  so  affectionately 
that,  one  year  after  his  decease,  in  1750,  she  died  of 
grief." 

The  daughter  of  this  mamage,  Sarah  Lennox,  was 
born  in  1746,  and  inherited  the  remarkable  beauty  of 
her  mother.  At  fifteen  years  of  age  she  appeared  at 
court.  George  the  Third  had  succeeded  his  grand- 
father George  the  Second  in  1760,  and  on  the  fourth  of 
June  in  the  following  year  the  first  anniversary  of  his 


286         THE  MOTHER  OF  THE  NAPIERS. 

accession  to  tlie  English  throne  was  kept  with  much 
splendor  at  St.  James's.  The  suri^assing  beauty  of 
Lady  Sarah  Lennox  was  then  fii'st  observed  by  the 
young  king  as  well  as  by  his  courtiers.  Horace  Wal- 
pole,  the  great  literary  gossip  of  the  times,  wTote  to 
Lady  Ailesbury,  that  "  the  birthday  exceeded  the 
splendors  of  Haroun  Alraschid  and  the  Arabian  Nights, 
when  people  had  nothing  to  do  but  to  scour  a  lantern 
and  send  a  genie  for  a  hamper  of  diamonds  and  rubies. 
Do  you  remember  one  of  those  stories  where  a  imnce 
has  eight  statues  of  diamonds,  which  he  overlooks 
because  he  fancies  he  wants  a  ninth,  and  to  his  great 
surprise  the  ninth  joroves  to  be  pure  flesh  and  blood, 
which  he  never  thought  of  i  Somehow  or  other  Lady 
Sarah  is  the  ninth  statue,  and  you  will  allow  has  bet- 
ter white  and  red  than  if  she  was  made  of  pearls  and 
rubies." 

The  young  king  did  not  soon  forget  the  lovely  girl 
whom  he  first  saw  at  this  anniversary.  Two  years  later 
he  feU  deeply  in  love  with  her,  and  although  he  had 
already  been  captivated  for  a  time  by  the  beauty  of 
Hannah  Lightfoot,  a  Quakeress,  he  became  far  more 
earnestly  enamored  of  Sarah  Lennox.  Her  brother-in- 
law,  Henry  Fox,  afterward  Lord  Holland,  noticed  the 
king's  feelings  toward  her,  and  encouraged  her  to  recip- 
rocate them  by  all  the  strategy  in  his  power.  She  is 
said  to  have  been  herself  in  love  with  Lord  Newbottle, 
afterward  Marquis  of  Lothian,  but  it  was  natural  for 
one  of  her  age  and  position  to  be  dazzled  for  the  moment 
at  the  splendid  possibility  of  becoming  Queen  of  Eng- 
land. "It  is  well  known,"  writes  Sir  Nathaniel 
Wraxall,  "  that  before  his  mamage  the  king  distin- 


a 

o 

GO 

5 
p 


as 

a 


CO 

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DC 

C 


THE  KING'S  FAVORITE.  289 

gnished  by  his  partiality  Lady  Sarah  Lennox,  then 
one  of  the  most  beautiful  young  women  of  high  rank 
in  the  kingdom,  Edward  the  Fourth  or  Henry  the 
Eighth  in  his  situation  would  have  married  her  and 
placed  her  on  the  throne.  .  .  .  But  the  king,  who, 
though  he  admired  her,  did  not  desire  to  make  her  his 
wife,  subdued  his  passion  by  the  strength  of  his  reason, 
his  principles,  and  his  sense  of  public  duty."  That 
the  king  had  no  desire,  however,  to  make  Lady  Sarah 
Lennox  his  wife  would  seem  to  be  contradicted  by 
other  testimony.  Some  attributed  his  breaking  off 
with  her  to  jealousy  of  Lord  ISTewbottle.  According  to 
the  Grenville  papers.  Lady  Sarah  "found  herself 
deprived  of  a  crown  and  of  her  lover,  Lord  Newbottle, 
who  complained  as  much  of  her  as  she  did  of  the 
king." 

It  is  perhaps  to  be  regretted  that  George  the  Third 
did  not  follow  his  inclinations  and  marry  Lady  Sarah, 
since  there  was  no  law  at  that  time  in  England  to  pre- 
vent the  sovereign  from  marrying  Ms  subject.  He  was 
probably  counter-influenced  by  Lord  Bute  and  his 
own  mother,  the  Princess  Dowager  of  Wales.  It  is 
certain  that  at  the  time  he  took  little  pains  to  conceal 
Ms  passion  from  those  about  him.  He  made  the  friend 
and  kinswoman  of  Lady  Sarah,  Lady  Susan  Strang- 
ways,  Ms  confidante.  According  to  the  account  which, 
more  than  six  years  afterward,  Thomas  Pitt  related  to 
George  Grenville,  "  His  Majesty  came  to  Lady  Susan 
Strangways  in  the  drawing-room,  and  asked  .Iier  in  a 
wMsper  if  she  did  not  think  the  coronation  would  be  a 
much  finer  sight  if  there  was  a  queen?"  She  said 
"Yes."     "He  then  asked  her  if  she  did  not  know 


290  THE  MOTHER   OF  THE   NAPIERS. 

somebody  who  would  grace  the  ceremony  in  the  prop- 
erest  manner  V  At  this  she  was  much  embarrassed, 
thinking  he  meant  herself  ;  but  he  w^ent  on  and  said, 
' '  I  mean  your  friend,  Lady  Sarah  Lennox.  Tell  her  so  ; 
and  let  me  have  her  answer  the  next  drawing-room 
day."  On  another  occasion  Lady  Susan  told  the  king 
casually  that  she  was  about  to  leave  London  for  a 
while.  "  But  you  will  return  in  the  summer  for  the 
coronation  ?"  said  the  king.  "■  I  hope  so,  sk,"  was  the 
reply.  "But,"  continued  the  Mng,  "they  talk  of  a 
wedding.  There  have  been  many  projDosals,  but  I 
think  an  English  match  would  do  better  than  a  foreign 
one.  Pray  tell  Lady  Sarah  Lennox  I  say  so."  Even 
when  the  king  was  consenting  to  an  arrangement  of 
marriage  with  Charlotte  of  Mecklenburg  Strelitz, 
George  Grenville  writes  that  "  Lady  Sarah  used  to 
meet  the  king  in  his  rides  early  in  the  morning,  driving 
in  a  chaise  with  Lady  Susan  Strangways  ;  and  once,  it 
is  said,  that  wanting  to  speak  to  him,  she  went  dressed 
like  a  servant-maid,  and  stood  among  the  crowd  in  the 
Guard-Room  to  say  a  few  words  to  him  as  he  passed 

by." 

There  is  a  picture,  we  do  not  remember  by  what 
painter,  of  Lady  Sarah  Lennox,  attired  as  a  shepherdess, 
and  with  a  rake  in  her  hand,  taking  her  share  with  the 
haymakers  at  Holland  House.  She  stayed  there  con- 
stantly while  the  court  remained  in  London,  and  its 
X)roximity  to  St.  James's  Palace  enabled  the  youthful 
king  to  ride  there  on  fine  mornings,  in  the  hope  of 
meeting  her  in  the  gardens  and  paying  her  his  hesitat- 
ing but  impassioned  compliments.  The  era  at  which 
she  bloomed  into  surpassing  beauty  was  remarkable 


MARRIAGE   OF   THE   KING.  291 

for  the  lo'celiness  of  some  of  its  women.  Tlie  two  Miss 
Gunnings,  who  came  from  Dublin  to  London,  and  used 
to  draw  crowds  around  them  in  the  street  and  park, 
must  have  been  very  beautiful  or  they  would  not  have 
bewitched  the  nobility  as  they  did.  But  even  the 
Duchess  of  Hamilton  and  Lady  Coventry  were  not  as 
classical  in  their  style  of  beauty  as  Sarah  Lennox. 
Beside  the  picture  of  her  as  a  haymaker,  Sir  Joshua 
Reynolds  has  left  us  her  portrait,  in  which  she  is  sacri- 
ficing to  the  Graces  dressed  in  classic  drapery.  George 
Selwyn's  "  Correspondence"  also  contains  a  half-length 
portrait  of  her  on  a  smaller  scale,  which  must  satisfy 
the  most  fastidious  critic  of  female  beauty  that  hers 
was  unsurpassed.  This  was  the  charming  girl  whose 
sister  Caroline  was  the  wife  of  Henry  Fox,  the  first 
Lord  Holland,  and  who  won  the  heart  though  not  the 
hand  of  George  the  Third,  then  a  young  man  of 
twenty -two.  He  who  in  after  life  showed  so  much 
obstinacy  seems  to  have  been  unduly  influenced  in  the 
matter  of  marriage.  His  council  voted  against  the 
marriage,  and  the  king  obeyed  them.  When  he  did 
actually  marry  the  future  prolific  mother  of  two  kings 
of  England  and  a  large  array  of  princes  and  princesses, 
Lady  Sarah  Lennox  was  one  of  the  ten  bridesmaids  to 
the  queen,  and  her  friend.  Lady  Susan  Strangways,  was 
another.  The  courtiers  who  witnessed  the  marriage 
watched  the  young  king's  face  for  the  emotion  they 
expected  to  see  in  it.  An  incident  which  happened  at 
the  drawing-room  on  the  day  following  disturbed  him 
for  the  moment.  Among  those  presented  to  theu' 
Majesties  was  the  aged  Earl  of  Westmoreland,  who  was 
partially  blind.     He  unluckily  mistook  Lady   Sarah 


292         THE  MOTHER  OF  THE  NAPIERS. 

Lennox  for  the  new  queen,  and  was  only  prevented  by 
those  around  him  from  kneeling  and  paying  homage 
to  her. 

That  the  king  did  not  soon  forget  the  impression  she 
had  made  upon  his  heart  was  shown  many  years  later, 
when  he  attended  one  of  the  performances  of  the 
charming  actress  Mrs.  Pope,  who  was  thought  to  bear  a 
striking  resemblance  both  in  face  and  manner  to  Lady 
Sarah  Lennox.  He  seemed  to  be  transported  to  the 
old  days  of  his  love-making,  and  forgetting  that  his 
prudish  and  snuff-taking  queen  sat  beside  him,  he  was 
heard  to  murmur  to  himself,  ' '  She  is  like  Lady  Sarah 
still." 

The  pedigree  of  the  mother  of  the  Napiers  was  as 
romantic  as  her  career.  William  Fraser  has  written 
and  published  at  Edinburgh  two  volumes  of  memoirs 
and  charters  of  the  ancient  family  of  "  The  Lennox." 
He  says  that  after  Charles  the  Second  had  revived  the 
dukedom  in  the  new  line  of  Lennox  and  Richmond, 
the  Lennox  estates  were  sold,  and  his  descendants,  the 
later  Dukes  of  Lennox,  have  possessed  theu'  Lennox 
title  entirely  separated  from  every  acre  of  the  Lennox 
territory.  It  must  suffice  for  Sarah  Lennox's  pedigree 
that  she  had  royal  blood  in  her  veins,  being  descended 
nearly  in  equal  degree  from  Henry  of  Navarre  and 
Charles  the  Second.  The  latter  was  her  great-grand- 
father, and  her  gi'eat-grandmother  was  the  notorious 
Louisa  de  Queronaille,  the  rival  of  Nell  Gwynne,  his 
French  mistress,  who  exercised  so  powerful  and  disas- 
trous an  influence  over  him,  and  whom  he  created 
Duchess  of  Portsmouth.  To  this  French  current  in 
her  veins  we  must  attribute  the  vivacity  and  sprightli- 


A   DIVORCED   WIFE.  293 

ness  of  this  pretty  creature,  and  perhaps  also  her  fond- 
ness for  admiration  and  her  moral  weakness  in  her 
earlier  life.  A  sad  story,  though,  alas,  not  an  uncom- 
mon one,  especially  in  the  times  in  which  she  lived, 
when  woman's  virtue  was  lightly  thought  of,  clouds 
her  early  married  life.  Having  lost,  as  we  have  seen, 
her  lover,  Lord  !N'ewbottle,  through  his  jealousy  of  the 
king's  attentions  to  her,  and  having  lost  the  king  on  his 
marriage  mth  Charlotte  Mecklenburg  Strelitz,  she  her- 
self married  Sir  Thomas  Charles  Bunbury,  a  sporting 
man  of  the  time,  whose  marriage  with,  her  was  dissolved 
by  the  House  of  Lords  in  1776.  There  were  no  divorce 
courts  in  England  in  those  days,  and  the  House  of 
Peers  alone  had  the  power  of  annulling  a  marriage. 
Moreover,  as  the  law  then  stood,  the  husband  alone 
could  be  the  plaintiff,  since  unfaithfulness  to  the  mar- 
riage vow  did  not  give  the  wife  a  legal  ground  of  com- 
plaint, although  the  same  crime  on  her  side  enabled 
him,  though  at  considerable  exj)ense,  to  get  his  union 
with  her  dissolved. 

The  reason  of  this  injustice  was  that  the  line  of 
descent  might  be  preserved,  which  the  husband's  adul- 
tery would  not  affect,  but  which  might  be  mixed  and 
broken  by  that  of  the  wife.  It  was  thought  but  just 
that  a  husband  should  be  sure  he  was  the  father  of  the 
children  born  by  his  wife.  Only  the  upper  and  richer 
classes  had  any  chance,  however,  of  obtaining  a  divorce 
from  Parliament.  The  middle  and  poorer  classes  had 
to  shift  for  themselves  as  best  they  could,  when 
unequally  yoked  with  a  partner  who  proved  unfaith- 
ful. The  fact  that  Sir  Charles  Bunbury,  who  was  sel- 
dom called  by  his  first  name,  "  Thomas,"  was  able  to 


294  THE  MOTHER  OF  THE  NAPIERS. 

get  rid  of  Sarali  Lennox  as  a  wife,  is  sufficient  proof 
that  slie  had  erred  and  wronged  him.  Otherwise,  the 
cowardly  and  disgusting  boast  of  the  Duke  de  Lauzun 
in  his  infamous  "Memoirs"  would  have  no  power  to 
blight  a  woman's  reputation  with  persons  of  honorable 
feeling.  Thomas  De  Quincey,  keen  in  his  analysis  of 
human  character,  has  justly  said  of  this  French  liber- 
tine and  scoundrel,  "  On  the  hypothesis  most  favorable 
to  the  writer,  the  basest  of  men,  he  is  self -denounced 
as  vile  enough  to  have  forged  the  stories  he  tells,  and 
cannot  complain  if  he  should  be  roundly  accused  of 
doing  that  which  he  has  taken  pains  to  prove  himself 
capable  of  doing."  > 

The  genuineness  of  the  Duke  de  Lauzun' s  memou's 
has  been  much  disputed,  and  some  have  held  that  while 
the  book  is  authentic  its  narrations  are  false.  Others 
have  deemed  the  book  itself  spurious  on  account  of  the 
atrocious  character  of  its  contents.  The  best  historical 
critics,  however,  accept  the  work  as  a  genuine  produc- 
tion of  the  infamous  French  nobleman. 

Those  who  wonder  at  the  furor  which  the  beauty  of 
Mrs.  Langtry  has  excited  in  this  country  as  well  as  in 
England,  ought  to  study  the  beauties  of  the  reign  of 
George  the  Third,  of  whom  Sarah  Lennox  was  one  of 
the  chief.  The  two  Miss  Grunnings,  whose  faces  are 
the  only  ones  that  can  challenge  hers  for  loveliness, 
were  the  untitled  daughters  of  an  Irish  gentleman, 
John  Gunning,  Esq.,  of  Castle  Coote,  by  Bridget, 
daughter  of  Theobald  Bourke,  Sixth  Viscount  Mayo. 
Marie,  the  elder  sister,  was  born  apparently  in  1733, 
and  Elizabeth,  the  younger,  in  the  following  year. 
\Ylien  they  first  appeared  in  court  in  1751,  the  one 


TWO   BEAUTIFUL   WOMEN.  295 

was   in   lier  nineteenth,   the  other   in   lier  eighteenth 
year. 

There  is  probably  no  instance  of  female  beauty  caus- 
ing so  ridiculous  an  idolatry  as  theirs  did.  Horace 
Walpole  writes  to  Sir  Horace  Mann  :  "  These  two  Irish 
girls,  of  no  fortune,  are  declared  the  handsomest 
women  alive.  I  think  their  being  two  so  handsome 
and  both  such  perfect  figures  is  their  chief  excellence, 
for,  singly,  I  have  seen  much  handsomer  women  than 
either  ;  however,  they  can't  walk  in  the  Park,  or  go  to 
Yauxhall,  but  such  crowds  follow  them,  that  they  are 
generally  driven  away." 

Their  marriages  were  romantic  enough.  The  first  to 
marry  was  Elizabeth,  the  younger,  who  on  the  14th  of 
February,  1752,  became  the  wife  of  James,  Duke  of 
Hamilton,  who  fell  in  love  with  her  at  a  masquerade, 
and  whom  Horace  WaljDole  describes  as  "  hot,  de- 
bauched, extravagant,  and  equally  damaged  in  his 
fortune  and  person."  Three  weeks  later  Maria  Gun- 
ning became  Countess  of  Coventry.  The  great  letter- 
writer  adds  :  "  The  world  is  still  mad  about  the  Gun- 
nings ;  the  Duchess  of  Hamilton  was  presented  on  Fri- 
day ;  the  crowd  was  so  great  that  even  the  noble  crowd 
in  the  dining-room  clambered  upon  chairs  and  tables 
to  look  at  her.  There  are  mobs  at  their  doors  to  see 
them  get  into  their  chairs  ;  and  people  go  early  to  get 
places  at  the  theatres  when  it  is  Ivnown  they  will  be 
there.  Dr.  Sacheverel  never  made  more  noise  than 
these  two  beauties."  And  again,  a  few  weeks  after- 
ward :  "  The  Gunnings  are  gone  to  their  several  cas- 
tles, and  one  hears  no  more  of  them,  except  that  such 
crowds  flock  to  see  the  Duchess  of  Hamilton  pass  that 


296         THE  MOTHER  OF  THE  NAPIERS. 

seven  hundred  people  sat  up  all  night  in  and  about  an 
inn  in  Yorkshire,  to  see  her  get  into  her  post-chaise 
next  morning." 

The  Duke  of  Hamilton  died  on  the  17th  of  January, 
1758,  but  his  widow  did  not  long  remain  a  duchess 
dowager,  for  on  the  3d  of  March  of  the  following  year 
she  became  Duchess  of  Argyle.  She  died  on  the  20th 
of  December,  1790,  but  her  elder  sister,  Maria,  Lady 
Coventry,  died  on  the  1st  of  October,  1760,  at  the  early 
age  of  twenty-six.  Her  death  was  caused  by  the  use 
of  cosmetics,  the  joaint  she  plastered  her  pretty  face 
vdth  checking  j)erspu'ation  and  causing  mortification. 
She  lived  latterly  with  the  curtains  of  her  bed  closed 
around  her,  that  her  disfigurement  might  not  be  seen 
and  talked  of. 

Neither  of  these  beauties  could  compare  in  intellect, 
even  if  they  could  in  physical  beauty,  with  the  m.other 
of  the  Napiers,  who  was  born  in  London  on  the  14th  of 
February,  1745,  and  was  therefore  twelve  or  thirteen 
years  their  junior.  Of  the  ten  unmarried  daughters  of 
dukes  and  earls  who  were  Queen  Charlotte's  brides- 
maids, Walpole  says  that  Lady  Sarah  was  "  by  far  the 
chief  angel ;"  and  again,  alluding  to  her  performing 
the  part  of  Jane  Shore  in  some  private  theatricals  at 
Holland  House,  he  says  :  "  When  Lady  Sarah  was  in 
white,  with  her  hair  about  her  ears,  and  on  the  ground, 
no  Magdalen  by  Correggio  was  ever  half  so  lovely  and 
expressive." 

Her  marriage  with  Sir  Thomas  Charles  Bunbury  took 
place  on  the  2d  of  June,  1762,  Avlien  she  was  in  her 
eighteenth  year.  His  estate  was  at  Barton,  in  Suffolk. 
He  was  the  sixth  baronet,  and  was  born  in  May,  1740. 


LADY   SARAH'S   LETTER.  297 

In  Ids  youth  he  held  the  appointment  of  secretary  of 
legation  at  Paris,  and  subsequently  that  of  secretary 
to  Lord  Weymouth  when  Lord-Lieutenant  of  Ireland. 
He  died  at  his  house  in  Pall  Mall,  on  the  21st  day  of 
March,  1821,  in  his  eighty-first  year.  Many  circum- 
stances rendered  him  a  remarkable  person  in  his  day, 
and  his  figure  was  familiar  on  all  the  thoroughfares  of 
London.  He  was  the  prince  and  father  of  the  turf,  and 
his  stud  was  the  finest  in  England.  He  made  large 
sums  by  betting,  and  that  he  was  prudent  in  his  gam- 
bling may  be  inferred  from  a  letter  from  Lady  Sarah 
to  George  Selwyn,  in  which  she  says  :  "  Sir  Charles 
games  from  morning  till  night,  but  he  has  never  yet 
lost  a  hundred  pounds  in  one  day.  He  gives  break- 
fasts and  dances,  and  is  quite  the  beau  gargon  here. 
He  sends  his  compliments  to  you  both,  and  says  he 
will  write  to  both,  but  I  do  not  believe  a  word  of  it,  so 
I  write  en  attendant.  I  do  not  comprehend  how  I  have 
the  courage  to  scribble  away  at  such  a  rate  to  '  Mr. 
Selwyn  the  wit,'  but  you  see  the  effect  of  fiattery. 
You  have  shown  such  partiality  to  me  that  I  am  per- 
suaded you  are  very  glad  to  hear  from  me,  even  though 
you  must  go  through  so  long  a  letter.  At  the  end  I 
shall  not  say  pray  excuse  this  scrawl,  but  only  beg 
you  will  burn  my  letters,  as  I  particularly  dislike  any- 
body's keeping  them  a  minute  after  they  are  read,  and 
I  will  run  the  risk  of  your  thinking  me,  xerj  tiresome, 
for  the  sake  of  obliging  you,  who  are  politeness  itself, 
to  answer  all  my  letters,  if  I  write  ever  so  often." 
This  was  wi-itten  on  August  8th,  1767,  at  Spa,  of  which 
she  adds  :  "  I  like  this  place  very  much.  I  dance  every 
other  night,  and  it  agrees  very  well  with  me,  for  I  am 


298  THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   NAPIERS. 

in  very  great  spirits.  We  have  got  two  very  agreeable 
men,  lately  arrived,  two  counts — brothers.  The  eldest 
is  a  very  handsome,  agreeable,  grand  coxcomb  ;  the 
youngest  a  very  pretty,  lively  young  man  of  eighteen, 
who  is  just  recovered  of  his  wounds  in  a  duel  fought 
for  his  mistress.  Q'' est  tres  hlen  dehuter  dans  le 
monde^  in  my  opinion.  The  men  that  we  see  most 
are  this  young  Polander,  two  Danes,  a  Hanoverian,  a 
Frenchman,  a  Swiss,  and  a  Dutchman.  The  last  is 
very  stupid,  and  we  only  admit  him  for  variety  ;  but 
really  the  rest  are  a  very  tolerable  set ;  at  least  they 
are  very  well  bred  if  they  are  not  very  clever,  and  that 
is  no  small  merit  here,  where  Lord  Fortrose,  a  mad 
brother  of  Mr.  Shaw  Stewart's,  and  a  pack  of  Irishmen 
are  hallooing  and  swearing  about  the  town  all  day.  To 
do  them  justice,  they  are  very  good-humored,  but  not 
very  agreeable.  I  really  must  end  this  amazing  long- 
letter,  with  an  excuse  for  making  you  pay  as  much  as 
I  fear  you  will  for  this.  Adieu  :  My  respects  and 
compliments  to  all  my  friends  at  Paris.'' 

The  Frenchman  here  referred  to  was  perhaps  the 
dastard  who  bragged  afterward  in  print  that  he  had 
triumphed  over  her  virtue.  His  vile  book  can  unhap- 
pily be  proved  to  be  genuine.  Tom  Moore  in  his  diary 
writes  :  "  Sat  next  to  Ladv  E.  Stuart  :  she  tokl  me 
that  the  Memoirs  of  the  Due  de  Lauzun  (which  of 
course  she  did  not  care  to  have  read)  were  supposed  to 
be  genuine,  bat  not  true.  Lord  Thanet  saw  nothing- 
improbable  in  them,  but  found  them  dull  from  tlieir 
probability."  Thackeray  says  in  "  The  Virginians,'"' 
with  unmistakable  allusion  to  him,  "  Tliere  lived  dur- 
ing the  last  century  a  certain  French  duke  and  marquis 


MARRIAGE   OF   LADY    SARAH.  299 

who  distinguished  himself  in  Europe,  and  America 
likewise,  and  has  obliged  posterity  by  leaving  behind 
him  a  choice  volume  of  Memoirs,  which  the  gentle 
reader  is  especially  warned  not  to  consult.  Having 
performed  the  part  of  Don  Juan  in  his  own  country,  in 
ours,  and  in  other  parts  of  Europe,  he  has  kindly  noted 
down  the  names  of  many  court  beauties  who  fell  vic- 
tims to  his  fascinations  ;  and  very  pleasing,  no  doubt, 
it  must  be  for  the  grandsons  and  descendants  of  the 
fashionable  persons  among  whom  our  brilliant  noble- 
man moved,  to  find  the  names  of  their  ancestresses 
adorning  M.  le  Due's  sprightly  pages,  and  their  frail- 
ties recorded  by  the  candid  writer  who  caused  them. 
It  is  some  comfort  to  know  that  the  chivalrous  Due  de 
Lauzun  perished  by  the  guillotine  in  the  days  of  the 
first  French  Eevolution." 

Sarah  Lennox  was  happily  childless  by  her  marriage 
with  Sir  Charles  Bunburv,  and  her  true  life  as  a  wife 
and  mother,  as  well  as  a  noble  and  suffering  woman, 
dates  really  from  her  divorce  from  him.  Only  a  short 
time  elapsed  before  the  Hon.  George  Napier,  who 
traced  his  descent  from  the  great  Montrose,  and  from 
Napier  of  Merchiston,  inventor  of  logarithms,  offered 
her  an  honorable  love.  She  accepted  him,  and  for  half 
a  century  her  life  was  one  of  purity,  happiness,  and 
peace.  "  The  sins  of  the  fathers,"  says  her  son,  Sir 
William  Napier,  "  are  visited  on  the  children."  Lord 
Napier,  grandson  of  the  mathematician,  lost  his  lands 
fighting  for  Charles  the  First  ;  he  reclaimed  them  at 
the  Restoration  from  Charles  the  Second,  but  was 
offered,  it  was  said,  a  dukedom  without  revenue 
instead  ;   it  was  refused  ;  total  neglect  followed,  and 


300  THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   NAPIERS. 

the  faithful  man  died  absolutely  destitute — even  starv- 
ed. Now  a  descendant  of  the  ungrateful,  dissolute 
monarch,  whose  merry  life  made  others  so  sad,  was 
united  to  a  descendant  of  the  despoiled  loid,  and  they 
and  their  children  were  to  struggle  with  poverty.  Had 
the  confiscated  lands  been  restored,  the  Napier  inheri- 
tance would  have  been  vast,  for  the  lost  estate  is  said 
to  have  comprised  all  the  ground  covered  by  the  new 
town  of  Edinburgh  up  to  the  tower  of  Merchiston. 

In  a  world  in  which  the  habitual  impurity  of  man  is 
readily  forgiven,  provided  he  has  money  and  influence 
to  keep  the  sepulchre  of  his  life  duly  whitewashed  by 
hypocrisy  and  secrecy,  but  where  one  false  step  by  a 
flattered,  deceived,  and  forsaken  woman  is  regarded  as 
a  stain  that  cannot  be  wiped  out,  so  that  in  nine  cases 
out  of  ten  she  is  forever  banished  from  the  circles  of 
so-called  respectability,  it  is  refreshing  to  find  one  man 
noble  enough,  like  George  Napier,  to  love  and  offer 
marriage  to  a  noble  woman  in  si)ite  of  her  misfortune, 
and  one  woman  wise  enough  to  be  grateful  for  such  a 
man's  trust,  and  to  show  her  sense  of  his  generous  pro- 
tection of  her  by  a  life  of  pure  devotion  to  him  and  to 
their  children.  Such,  from  the  date  of  her  second  mar- 
riage, was  the  true  repentance  of  a  nobler  life  as 
exhibited  by  Sarah  Napier.  In  her  thoughtless  youth, 
passed  at  a  time  when  French  immorality  had  cor- 
rui)ted  English  life,  she  had  her  day  of  sorrow,  but 
although  the  last  years  of  her  life  were  spent  in  total 
l)lindness,  she  then  realized  in  inward  peace  the  prom- 
ise, "  At  evening  time  there  shall  be  light," 

Childless  by  her  first  marriage,  she  became  the 
mother  of  many  childi-en  by  her  second.     If  Cornelia, 


MOTHER  AND  SONS.  301 

the  Roman  matron,  was  proud  of  being  the  mother  of 
the  Gracchi,  Sarah  Nai)ier  had  not  less  cause  for  being 
proud  of  her  sons.  The  greatest  of  them,  the  late  Sir 
Charles  James  Napier,  bore  in  features  and  the  expres- 
sion of  the  eyes,  at  sixteen  years  of  age,  a  remarkable 
likeness  to  what  his  mother  had  been  at  the  same  age. 
His  life  and  diary  are  full  of  affectionate  letters  and 
greetings  to  his  mother.  "  Your  letter,  dearest 
mother,  surj)rised  me  by  suffering  a  wish  to  keep  the 
foolish  quarrel  a  secret  from  my  father  ;  by  no  means. 
But  no  more  of  this  :  it  is  hateful  to  think  how  near 
foolish  passion  was  involving  me  in  a  desperate  duel." 
"  January  1st.  Happy  new  year  and  many  of  them  to 
my  dearest  mother."  And  when,  while  he  was  in 
Greece  in  1826,  he  received  the  tidings  of  his  mother's 
death,  on  the  20th  of  xA.ugust  in  that  year,  aged  eighty- 
one,  we  read  that  the  dreadful  calamity  bowed  him  to 
the  dust.  The  tenor  of  his  long  correspondence  must 
speak  for  the  depth  of  his  affliction  ;  no  Journals  or 
letters  describing  his  feelings  exist  ;  his  grief  was 
silent.  The  event  brought  him  at  once  to  England, 
where  he  remained  for  several  months,  sorrowing  in 
secret,  yet  presenting  his  usual  firm  front  to  adver- 
sity. 

His  military  career  was  a  splendid  one,  and  Corunna, 
Virginia,  and  India  were  the  chief  scenes  of  his  valor. 
The  small  British  army  were  retreating  before  the 
French  from  Astorga  to  Corunna.  They  beheld  the 
■wintry  sea,  but  no  friendly  squadron  was  upon  it  to 
rescue  them.  The  terrible  explosion  described  by  Sir 
William  Napier  took  place,  and  then  "  stillness, 
slightly  interrupted  by  the  waves  of  the  shore,  sue- 


302  THE   MOTHER   OF   THE   NAPIERS. 

ceeded,  and  the  business  of  war  went  on/'  Charles  and 
William  kept  together,  and  as  they  were  going  into  the 
battle  a  wounded  officer  on  a  stretcher  was  carried  by, 
and  when  Charles  asked  who  it  was,  he  was  told,  ".It 
is  Captain  George  Xapier,  mortally  wounded."  This 
was  his  brother,  but  he  recovered  from  his  wounds. 
In  that  battle  of  Corunnafell  Sir  John  Moore,  a  cannon 
ball  "  breaking  the  ribs  over  his  heart,  and  tearing  the 
muscles  of  the  breast  into  long  strips,  interlaced  by  the 
recoil  from  the  dragging  of  the  shot  ;"  and  no  sigh  or 
groan  escaped  the  dying  man's  lips,  but  only,  "  I  would 
rather  my  sword  should  go  out  of  the  field  with  me," 
and  the  last  words  :  "  I  trust  the  people  of  England 
will  be  satisfied  :  I  hope  my  country  will  do  me  jus- 
tice." Charles  Napier  himself  was  shockingly  muti- 
lated, and  his  life  was  saved  by  the  intercession  of  a 
little  drummer-boy.  The  blind  mother  in  England 
wept  when  she  heard  of  her  wounded  son  being  a  pris- 
oner of  the  French,  who  treated  him  with  chivalrous 
kindness. 

In  the  war  with  us  of  1812  he  again  saw  active  ser- 
vice, and  he  records  in  his  diary  that  he  could  not  kill 
an  enemy  who  asked  for  quarters  in  the  mother 
tongue,  because  it  seemed  like  killing  one  of  his  own 
countrymen.  But  the  grandest  of  his  triumphs  was  as 
the  victor  of  the  bloody  battle  of  Meance,  when  with 
two  thousand  seven  hundred  English  and  native  troops 
he  routed  twenty  thousand  intrenched  Belooches  and 
Sikhs.  The  battle  was  fought  on  the  17th  of  February, 
1843,  and  by  it  Scinde  was  subdued  and  subjected  to 
British  rule.  He  and  his  brothers  lived  to  a  good  old 
age,  as  their  blind  mother,  the  once  beautiful  and  frail 


LADY    SARAH'S   ANCESTRY.  303 

court  beauty,  Sarah  Lennox,  had  done,  who  was  the 
last  great-granddaughter  of  Charles  the  Second  and  the 
aunt  of  Charles  James  Fox,  as  well  as  the  mother  of 
the  Napiers. 


JEAN   PAUL  RICHTER'S  MOTHER. 

The  influence  of  a  good  mother  on  a  great  man's  life 
is  often  like  a  gleam  of  sunlight  falling  upon  some 
grand  picture,  which  would  else  remain  in  shadow  and 
have  its  finest  touches  unrevealed.  While  it  is  the 
light  that  beautifies  the  picture,  it  is  the  picture  which 
makes  us  conscious  of  the  light.  So  it  was  with  Jean 
Paul  Richter's  mother  and  himself.  We  should  scarcely 
be  conscious  of  her  silent  influence,  sejDarated  as  they 
were  after  his  father,  the  good  pastor's  death,  but  for 
the  allusions  he  so  often  made  to  her,  and  the  tender 
and  playful  letters — playful  but  never  silly — which  he 
writes  to  her.  If  Jean  Paul  Richter  had  no  other  title 
to  a  "  name  to  live"  than  his  words,  "  To  the  man  who 
has  had  a  mother  all  women  are  sacred  for  her  sake," 
his  memory  would  deserve  to  be  immortal. 

It  would  be  difficult  among  the  works  of  genius  to 
find  a  soul  more  thoroughly  domestic  than  that  of  Jean 
Paul  Richter.  Home  was  the  garden  in  which  his 
intellectual  and  moral  nature  grew,  and  home  affections 
were  the  flowers  that  filled  his  early  life  with  fragrance 
and  beauty.  Goldsftiith  has  pictured  the  country 
pastor  and  parsonage  so  pathetically  in  the  "  Vicar  of 
Wakefield,"  that  even  Goethe  declared  it  to  be  the 
sweetest  pastoral  story  in  any  language  ;  but  where, 
even  in  Goldsmith,  who,  like  Jean  Paul  Richter,  was  a 
poor  country  pastor's  son,  shall  we  find  a  picture  more 


A   PASTOR'S    HOME.  305 

exquisite  in  its  simi)licity  tlian  this  wliicli  describes  liis 
early  home,  his  father  studying  his  sermons  before  the 
dew  is  off  the  fields,  and  his  mother  at  evening  bringing 
them  their  simple  meal.  "  The  morning  sparkled,''  he 
writes,  "  with  the  undried  dew,  when  I  carried  his 
coffee  to  my  father  in  the  pastor's  garden,  lying  outside 
the  village,  where,  in  a  small  pleasure-house,  open  on 
every  side,  he  committed  his  sermon  to  memory.  In 
the  evening  our  mother  brought  us,  for  our  second 
meal,  the  salad  prepared  by  herself,  and  currants  and 
raspberries  from  the  garden.  It  belongs  to  the  unac- 
knowledged country  pleasures,  that  of  being  able  to 
sup  in  the  evenings  without  kindling  a  light.  After 
we  had  enjoyed  this,  my  father  seated  himself  with  his 
pipe  in  the  open  air  ;  that  is,  in  the  walled  court  of 
the  parsonage,  and  I  and  my  brother  sprang  about  in 
our  night-gowns  in  the  fresh  evening  air,  as  freely  as 
the  crossing  swallows  above  us.  We  llew  nimbly  here 
and  there,  till,  like  them,  we  bore  us  orderly  to  our 
nests." 

To  the  genial  springtime  in  the  country  parsonage 
Jean  Paul  looked  back  with  pleasure  in  after  life. 
*'  It  is  merely  necessary  in  villages,"  he  says,  "  to  draw 
away  the  curtain  of  snow  from  the  earth  for  its  joys  to 
begin.  The'  city  has  its  pleasures  only  in  the  winter  ; 
ploughing  and  sowing  are  a  countryman's  pleasure- 
harvest,  and  for  a  pastor  who  does  his  own  farming 
they  open  new  scenes  to  his  secluded  sons."  Those 
sons  helped  the  farmer-pastor  in  sowing,  planting,  and 
haymaking.  "  My  father,"  he  adds  with  pride,  "  did 
not  stand  by  the  field  laborers  as  a  taskmaster  (al- 
though they  were  feudal  tenants),  but  as  a  friendly 


OG  JEAN   PAUL   RICHTER'S   MOTHER. 


ouij 


shepherd  of  souls,  that  would  take  part  at  the  same 
time  with  nature  and  with  his  spiritual  children." 

This  happy  time  of  childhood  and  rural  contentment 
did  not  last  long.  Good  Pastor  Richter  died  when 
Jean  Paul  was  sixteen  years  old.  The  boy,  who  in  his 
autobiography  describes  himself  as  deeming  the  young 
swallows  happy  because  they  could  sit  so  secretly  and 
safely  through  the  night  in  their  walled  nests,  and  to 
whom  the  pigeon-house  on  the  roof  was  a  miniature 
"  Louvre  or  Escurial,"  was  henceforth  to  fight  his  own 
battles,  make  his  own  homestead,  and  win  his  own 
bread.  Yet  he  never  forgot  the  widowed  mother,  who 
employed  her  lonely  hours  in  spinning  to  relieve  her 
poverty.  Dearly,  like  many  other  mothers,  had  she 
wished  that  her  son,  who  had  been  placed  by  his  father 
at  the  gymnasium  or  public  college  at  Hof,  should 
follow  the  profession  of  a  clergyman.  About  three 
years  before  he  died,  Pastor  Richter  had  removed  from 
the  earlier  parsonage  above  described  to  Swarzenbach 
on  the  Saale.  Hof  was  about  six  miles  distant.  He 
went  thence  to  the  University  of  Leipsic  in  1781,  when 
he  was  eighteen  years  of  age.  Here  he  touchingly 
writes  to  a  friend:  "Do  you  know  what  especially 
impels  me  to  industry  ?  Precisely  what  you  have  said 
in  your  letter — my  mother.  I  owe  it  to  her  to  endeavor 
to  sweeten  a  part  of  her  life,  that  otherwise  has  been 
so  unfortunate,  and  to  lessen  by  my  help  and  S3^mx)athy 
the  great  sorrow  she  has  suffered  through  the  loss  of 
my  father.  .  .  .  Were  it  not  for  my  mother,  I  would 
never  during  ray  whole  life  take  a  public  office." 

While  his  mother  was  urging  him  to  become  a  pastor 
like  his  father,    Jean  Paul  himself  was  growing  en- 


AN   AFFECTIONATE   SON.  307 

thusiastic  with  the  thought  of  becoming  an  author. 
He  writes  his  mother  that  should  he  succeed  in  this, 
their  poverty  would  soon  be  over,  and  when  she  asks, 
in  deep  anxiety,  what  sort  of  books  he  means  to  write, 
he  answers  :  "  They  are  neither  theological  nor  judicial, 
and  if  I  should  tell  you  the  titles  it  would  signify  noth- 
ing. They  are  satmcal,  droll  books.  Indeed,  I  cannot 
but  smile  when  you  make  me  the  edifying  offer  to 
listen  to  my  preaching  in  the  Spital  Kirche  in  Hof. 
Tliink  you,  then,  it  is  so  much  honor  to  preach  1  This 
honor,  however,  can  any  poor  student  receive,  and  it  is 
easy  to  make  a  sermon  in  one's  dreams  ;  but  to  make 
a  book  is  ten  times  more  difficult." 

Success  came  at  last,  although  not  in  financial  mag- 
nitude. It  is,  however,  pleasing  to  note  that  the  first 
money  he  received  for  literary  work  he  gave  to  the 
"good  mother,"  as  he  called  her.  "  The  whole  ful- 
ness of  his  joy  and  success  was  poured  out  for  his 
mother,  who  needed  indeed  this  balsam  of  filial  love. 
The  moment  he  received  the  thirty  ducats,  he  set  out 
to  walk  from  Schwartzenbach  to  Hof,  where  his  mother 
then  lived.  On  his  way,  by  the  light  of  the  stars,  he 
thought  of  his  mother's  astonishment,  her  joy  and  her 
pious  gratitude  to  heaven,  and  entering  late  at  night 
the  low  apartment  where  she  sat  spinning  by  the  light 
of  the  fire,  he  poured  the  whole  golden  treasure  into 
her  lap  !" 

The  mother  thus  tenderly  beloved  died  in  1797,  when 
Jean  Paul  was  himself  thirty-four  years  old.  One  of 
the  keenest  self-reproaches  of  his  kindly  and  filial 
nature  was  that  he  had  treated  too  lightly  the  symp- 
toms of  her  approaching  dissolution,  and  that  owing  to 


308  JEAN   PAUL   RICHTER'S   MOTHER. 

his  delay  on  the  journey  to  Hof  to  see  her,  he  received 
intelligence  that  she  was  no  more.  The  strong  affection 
he  felt  for  her  is  a  proof  that,  if  not  a  great  woman,  she 
was  a  good  one,  and  had  shown  herself  a  true  mother 
to  her  illustrious  son. 


MADAME  NECKER,   THE  MOTHER   OF 
MADAME  DE   STAEL. 

Suzanne  Curchod,  afterward  Madame  Necker  and 
mother  of  Madame  de  Stael,  was  born  in  the  parsonage 
of  the  village  of  Grassier  or  Grassy,  on  the  borders  of 
the  Yand  country  and  France.  Her  father,  Louis 
Antony  Curchod,  was  the  Protestant  pastor  of  the 
Swiss  village,  and  the  only  child  of  his  marriage  with 
the  beautiful  Mile,  d' Albert  de  Nasse  was  baptized  in 
the  little  Protestant  church  at  Grassy  on  the  2d  of 
June,  1737.  She  lived  to  be  one  of  the  most  remark- 
able women  of  an  eventful  time,  as  her  daughter, 
Madame  De  Stael,  did  after  her.  From  her  mother 
Suzanne  Gurchod  inherited  great  personal  beauty. 
She  came  of  a  good  family  in  Dauphiny,  and  her 
parents,  who  belonged  to  the  Southern  noblesse,  were 
natives  of  the  little  city  of  Montelimart.  They  were 
among  the  number  of  those  Protestant  families  w^ho 
left  France  on  account  of  the  persecutions  they  were 
subject  to  in  the  reign  "of  Louis  XV.  They  settled  at 
Lausanne,  in  Switzerland,  where  the  beauty  of  their 
daughter  made  a  strong  impression.  An  old  friend  of 
her  mother's  recalled  those  early  days  long  afterward 
to  Madame  Necker.  "  I  was  at  Lausanne,"  she  wrote, 
"when  the  beautiful  Mile,  d' Albert  arrived  there. 
Xothing  was  talked  of  but  her  beauty,  and  the  merit 
which  had  led  her  to  renounce  the  comforts  which  she 


310  THE  MOTHER  OF  MADAME  DE  STAfiL. 

had  enjoyed  in  her  own  country  ;  and  afterward  she 
preferred  the  late  M.  Curchod,  with  little  fortune  and 
great  deserts,  to  another  very  wealthy  suitor. " 

If  Suzanne  Curchod  inherited  beauty  as  well  as 
virtue  from  her  mother,  she  had  not  less  reason  to  feel 
grateful  to  her  father  for  the  care  he  took  of  her  educa- 
tion. He  taught  her  Latin  and  perhaps  a  little  Greek 
himself,  and  supplied  her  with  teachers  of  the  natural 
sciences  and  the  refined  arts.  She  borrowed  works  on 
geometry  and  physics  from  the  professors  at  Geneva 
or  Lausanne,  and  one  of  her  instructors,  M.  Lesage, 
wrote  to  her  some  years  after  her  marriage,  "If  you 
miss  the  conversations  that  we  used  to  hold  on  physics, 
I  miss  them  equally  because  you  understood  admu'ably 
well  the  explanation  I  gave  you  of  my  system,  which 
made  me-  presume  that  you  would  also  master  very 
weU  the  proofs  by  which  I  support  it. " 

The  Swiss  village  and  the  quiet  parsonage  might 
seem  a  narrow  world  for  the  early  days  of  one  whose 
salon  in  later  years  at  Paris,  when  she  was  the  wife  of 
the  rich  banker  and  Controller-General  of  France,  was 
a  centre  of  attraction  to  the  leading  spirits  of  the  age. 
But  a  village  or  hamlet  near  some  city  which  is  an 
intellectual  and  literary  centre  catches  the  healthy 
contagion  of  it.  Crassy  was  fed  with  news  and  knowl- 
edge from  Geneva,  and  many  were  the  young  preachers 
of  that  famous  seat  of  Calvin  who  were  glad  to  preach 
and  expound  Scripture  for  Pastor  Curchod,  in  order 
that  they  might  enjoy  the  conversation  and  admire  the 
beauty  of  his  daughter.  The  congregation  perhaps 
did  not  suspect  the  cause  of  their  being  privileged  to 
listen  to  so  many  youthful  ministers  from  Geneva  or 


A   YOUNG   GIRL'S   LOVERS.  311 

Lausanne.  But  the  Rev.  Messieurs  Isaac  Cardoini 
and  G.  Francillon  bound  themselves  in  writing  to  the 
fair  object  of  their  ministrations,  "  to  come  and  preach 
at  Grassy  in  presence  of  the  very  amiable  Miss  Suzanne 
Curchod  every  time  that  she  should  require  it,  without 
waiting  to  be  asked,  besought,  urged,  and  conjured, 
since  of  all  pleasures  the  sweetest  to  them  was  to  oblige 
her  on  every  occasion." 

As  Grassy  is  situated  about  two  leagues  from  the 
shore  of  the  Lake  of  Geneva,  and  the  coach  from 
Geneva  to  Lausanne  did  not  pass  that  way,  Pastor 
Gurchod  used  to  lend  his  horse,  Grison  by  name,  to  his 
clerical  assistants  on  Monday  morning,  and  as  the  horse 
had  to  be  returned,  the  borrower  had  always  a  pretext 
for  another  visit.  Madame  ISTecker  was  at  this  time 
unskilled  in  the  ways  and  devices  of  the  world,  and 
accepted  gladly  and  innocently  all  the  homage  of 
admiration  she  received.  A  more  experienced  friend, 
however,  thought  some  of  the  young  preachers  too 
expressive,  and  wrote  to  Suzanne  severely  :  "  You  have 
many  adorers,  who,  under  pretext  of  coming  to  preach 
for  your  father,  come  to  court  you.  Does  not  sound 
reason  tell  you  that  as  soon  as  they  have  done  preach- 
ing you  should  drive  them  away  with  a  broomstick  or 
keep  yourself  concealed?"  Very  proper  advice,  no 
doubt ;  but  if  Suzanne  Gurchod  had  acted  upon  it,  we 
fear  her  father  would  have  found  few  youthful  substi- 
tutes in  the  village  pulpit  of  Grassy. 

It  was  the  fortune  of  Suzanne  Gurchod  to  make 
friends  and  lovers  both  by  her  intelligence  and  her 
beauty.  The  most  noteworthy  episode  of  her  unmar- 
ried life  was  the  passion  she  inspired  in  one  of  the 


312  THE  MOTHER  OF   MADAME   DE   STAEL. 

greatest  writers  of  modern  times.  Edward  Gibbon,  the 
historian  of  tlie  "  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Koman 
Empire."  Gibbon  was  bom  in  1737.  and  at  the  age  of 
sixteen  he  was  sent  by  his  father  to  the  Eev.  Mr. 
PaviUai'd's  boardin2:-school  at  Lausanne.  Durins:  his 
stay  here  he  became  acquainted  with  ^llle.  Curchod. 
Tlier  became  natiiiullv  in  love  with  each  other,  and 
were  engaged  to  become  man  and  wife.  Her  parents 
assented  to  the  entra^ement,  but  Gibbon's  father  was 
unrelentingly  opposed  to  it.  Rousseau  and  others 
have  blamed  Gibbon  severely  for  breakino:  off  the 
engagement  in  obedience  to  his  father,  but  we  must 
remember  that  he  was  at  that  time  wholly  dependent 
upon  him  for  support,  and  that  the  English  view  of 
filial  dutv  was  much  more  stringent  then  than  it  is 
now.  Mr.  James  C.  Morrison,  in  his  life  of  Gibbon  in 
''  Enfflish  Men  of  Letters,"  savs  :  "  It  would  be  diffi- 
cult  to  explain  why,  excej)t  on  that  principle  of  deci- 
mation bv  which  Macaulav  accounted  for  the  outcry 
a^rainst  Lord  Bvron.  Gibbon's  solitary  and  innocent 
love  passage  has  been  made  the  theme  of  a  good  deal 
of  malicious  comment.  The  parties  most  interested, 
and  who,  we  may  presume,  l-mew  the  circumstances 
better  than  any  one  else,  seem  to  have  been  quite  satis- 
fied with  each  other's  conduct.  Gibbon  and  Mile. 
Curchod,  afterward  Madame  iXecker.  remained  on 
terms  of  the  most  intimate  friendship  till  the  end  of  the 
former's  life.  This  might  be  supposed  sufficient.  But 
it  has  not  been  so  considered  bv  e^il  ton2:ues.  Mile. 
Suzanne  Curchod  was  bom  about  the  year  1740  :  her 
father  was  the  Calvinist  minister  of  Crassy.  her  mother 
a  French   Huguenot  who   had  preferred  her  religion 


GIBBON'S   EARLY   LOVE.  313 

to  lier  country.  She  had  received  a  liberal  and  even 
learned  education  from  her  father,  and  was  as  attrac- 
tive in  person  as  she  was  accomplished  in  mind.  ^  ""  She 
was  beautiful  with  that  pure  original  beauty  which 
depends  on  early  youth' '  (Sainte-Beuve).  In  1757  she 
was  the  talk  of  Lausanne,  and  could  not  appear  in  an 
assembly  or  at  the  play  without  being  surrounded  by 
admirers  ;  she  was  called  La  Belle  Curchod.  Gibbon' s 
curiosity  was  piqued  to  see  such  a  prodigy,  and  he  was 
smitten  with  love  at  first  sight,  "  I  found  her,"  he 
says,  "  learned  without  pedantry,  lively  in  conversa- 
tion, pure  in  sentiment,  and  elegant  in  manners."  He 
was  twenty  and  she  seventeen  years  of  age  (her  great- 
grandson  Othenin  d*  Haussonville  is  mistaken  in  saying 
she  was  born  in  1737,  the  same  year  as  Gibbon)  ;  no 
impediment  was  placed  in  the  way  of  their  meeting, 
and  he  was  a  frequent  guest  in  her  father"  s  house.  In 
fact.  Gibbon  paid  his  court  with  an  assiduity  which 
makes  an  exception  in  his  usually  unromantic  nature. 
"  She  listened,"  he  says,  "to  the  voice  of  truth  and 
passion,  and  I  might  presume  to  hope  that  I  had  made 
some  impression  on  a  virtuous  heart."  ^Ye  must 
remember  that  this  and  other  rather  glowing  passages 
in  his  memoirs  were  written  in  his  old  age,  when  he 
had  returned  to  Lausanne,  and  when,  after  a  long 
separation  and  many  vicissitudes,  he  and  Madame 
Necker  were  again  thrown  together  in  an  intimacy  of 
friendship  which  revived  old  memories.  Letters  of 
hers  to  him  show  this  in  a  striking  light.  He  indulged, 
he  says,  his  dream  of  felicity,  but  on  his  return  to 
England  he  soon  discovered  that  his  father  would  not 
hear  of  this  "strange  alliance,"  and  then  follows  the 


314  THE   MOTHER   OF   MADAME   DE    STAEL. 

sentence  which  lias  degraded  him  in  the  eyes  of  some 
persons.  "  After  a  painful  struggle  I  yielded  to  my 
fate:  I  sighed  as  a  lover,  I  obeyed  as  a  son."  What 
else  he  was  to  do  under  the  circumstances  does  not 
appear.  He  was  wholly  dependent  on  his  father,  and 
on  the  Continent,  at  least,  parental  authority  is  not 
regarded  as  a  trifling  impediment  in  such  cases.  Gib- 
bon could  not  have  married  Mile.  Curchod  as  an  exile 
and  a  pauper,  if  he  had  openly  withstood  his  father's 
wishes.  "  All  for  love"  is  a  very  pretty  maxim,  but 
it  is  apt  to  entail  trouble  when  practically  applied. 
Jean  Jacques  Rousseau,  who  had  the  most  beautiful 
sentiments  on  paper,  but  who  in  real  life  was  not 
always  a  model  of  self-denial,  found  great  fault  with 
Gibbon's  conduct.  Gibbon,  as  a  plain  man  of  rather 
prosaic  good  sense,  behaved  neither  heroically  nor 
meanly.  Time,  absence,  and  the  scenes  of  a  new  life, 
which  he  found  in  England,  had  their  usual  effect :  his 
passion  vanished.  "  My  cure,"  he  says,  "  was  acceler- 
ated by  a  faithful  report  of  the  tranquillity  and  cheer- 
fulness of  the  lady  herself,  and  my  love  subsided  in 
friendship  and  esteem."  The  probability,  indeed,  that 
he  and  Mile.  Curchod  would  see  each  other  again  must 
have  seemed  remote  in  the  extreme.  Euroj)e  and 
England  were  involved  in  the  Seven  Years'  War  ;  he 
was  fixed  at  liome,  and  an  officer  in  the  militia  ; 
Switzerland  was  far  off  ;  when  and  where  were  they 
likely  to  meet  ?  They  did,  contrary  to  all  expecta- 
tion, meet  again,  and  renewed  terms  not  so  much  of 
friendship  as  of  affection.  Mile.  Curchod,  as  the 
wife  of  Necker,  became  somewhat  of  a  celebrity, 
and  it   is  chiefly  owing  to  these  last  named  circum- 


GIBBON   AND   SUZANNE.  315 

stances   tliat   the  world  lias   ever  heard  of   Gibbon's 
early  love. 

Gibbon's  own  acconnt  of  his  affection  for  Suzanne 
Cnrchod,  in  his  "Autobiographic  Memoirs,"  ought, 
however,  to  be  read  in  full  by  those  Avho  wish  to  form 
a  dispassionate  judgment  of  his  conduct.  "  I  hesi- 
tate," he  says,  "from  the  apprehension  of  ridicule, 
when  I  approach  the  delicate  subject  of  my  early  iove. 
By  this  word  I  do  not  mean  the  x)olite  attention,  the 
gallantry,  without  hope  or  design,  which  has  originated 
in  the  spirit  of  chivalry,  and  is  interwoven  with  the 
texture  of  French  manners.  I  understand  by  this  pas- 
sion the  union  of  desire,  friendship,  and  tenderness, 
which  is  inflamed  by  a  single  female,  which  prefers  her 
to  the  rest  of  her  sex,  and  which  seeks  the  possession 
as  the  supreme  or  the  sole  happiness  of  our  being.  I 
need  not  blush  at  recollecting  the  object  of  my  choice  ; 
and  though  my  love  was  disappointed  of  success,  I  am 
rather  proud  that  I  was  once  capable  of  feeling  such  a 
pure  and  exalted  sentiment.  The  personal  attractions 
of  'Mile.  Suzanne  Curchod  were  embellished  by  the 
virtues  and  talents  of  the  mind.  Her  fortune  was 
humble,  but  her  family  was  respectable.  Her  mother, 
a  native  of  France,  had  preferred  her  religion  to  her 
country.  The  profession  of  her  father  did  not  extin- 
guish the  moderation  and  philosophy  of  his  temper, 
and  he  lived  content  with  a  small  salary  and  laborious 
duty,  in  the  obscure  lot  of  minister  of  Grassy,  in  the 
mountains  that  separate  the  Pays  de  Yaud  from  the 
county  of  Burgundy.  In  the  solitude  of  a  sequestered 
v-illage  he  bestowed  a  liberal  and  even  learned  educa- 
tion on  his  only  daughter.     She  surpassed  his  hopes 


316  THE   MOTHER   OF  MADAME   DE   STAEL. 

by  her  proficiency  in  the  sciences  and  languages  ;  and 
in  her  short  visits  to  some  relations  at  Lausanne,  the 
wit,  the  beauty,  and  the  erudition  of  Mile.  Curchod 
were  the  theme  of  universal  applause.  The  report  of 
such  a  prodigy  awakened  my  curiosity  ;  I  saw,  and 
loved,  r  found  her  learned  without  pedantry,  lively  in 
conversation,  pure  in  sentiment,  and  elegant  in  man- 
ners ;  and  the  first  sudden  emotion  was  fortified  by  the 
habits  and  knowledge  of  a  more  familiar  acquaintance. 
She  permitted  me  to  make  her  two  or  three  visits  at 
her  father's  house.  I  passed  some  happy  days  there, 
in  the  mountains  of  Burgundy,  and  her  parents  honor- 
ably encouraged  the  connection.  In  a  calm  retu-ement 
the  gay  vanity  of  youth  no  longer  fluttered  in  her 
bosom  ;  she  listened  to  the  voice  of  truth  and  passion, 
and  I  might  presume  to  hope  that  I  had  made  some 
impression  on  a  virtuous  heart.  At  Grassy  and  Lau- 
sanne I  indulged  my  dream  of  felicity  ;  but  on  my 
return  to  England  I  soon  discovered  that  my  father 
would  not  hear  of  this  strange  alliance,  and  that  with- 
out his  consent  I  was  myself  destitute  and  helpless. 
After  a  painful  struggle  I  yielded  to  my  fate  ;  I  sighed 
as  a  lover,  I  obeyed  as  a  son  ;  my  wound  was  insen- 
sibly healed  by  time,  absence,  and  the  habits  of  a  new 
life.  My  cure  was  accelerated  by  a  faithful  report  of 
the  tranquillity  and  cheerfulness  of  the  lady  herself, 
and  my  love  subsided  in  friendship  and  esteem.  The 
minister  of  Grassy  soon  afterward  died  ;  his  stipend 
died  with  him  ;  his  daughter  retired  to  Geneva,  where, 
by  teaching  young  ladies,  she  earned  a  hard  subsist- 
ence for  herself  and  her  mother  ;  but  in  her  lowest  dis- 
tress she  maintained  a  spotless  reputation  and  a  digni- 


MARRIED   TO  NECKER.  317 

fied  behavior.  A  rich  banker  of  Paris,  a  citizen  of 
Geneva,  had  tl^e  good  fortune  and  good  sense  to  dis- 
cover and  possess  this  inestimable  treasure  ;  and  in  the 
capital  of  taste  and  luxury  she  resisted  the  tem]3tations 
of  wealth,  as  she  had  sustained  the  hardships  of  indi- 
gence. The  genius  of  her  husband  had  exalted  him  to 
the  most  consi^icuous  stations  in  Europe.  In  every 
change  of  i^rosperity  and  disgrace  he  has  reclined  on 
the  bosom  of  a  faithful  friend  ;  and  Mile.  Curchod  is 
now  the  wife  of  M.  Necker,  the  minister,  and  perhaps 
the  legislator  of  the  French  monarchy. ' ' 

Thackeray  remarks,  in  one  of  his  novels,  that  the 
lover  who  can  analyze  his  feelings  sufficiently  to  put 
them  into  artistic  language,  and  who  remembers  in  his 
agony  that  sorrow  rhymes  with  to-morrow,  cannot  be 
very  far  gone.  The  calm  analysis  of  Gibbon,  although 
after  a  long  interval,  and  the  prudential  view  he  took 
of  the  situation,  compel  us  to  think,  in  spite  of  biog- 
raphers and  sentimentaKsts,  that  his  love  for  Suzanne 
Curchod  had  no  very  gi-eat  depth.  She,  however, 
appears  really  to  have  suffered  much,  on  their  separa- 
tion, and  one  letter  of  hers,  which  he  aj^pears  to  have 
returned,  perhaps  at  her  request,  or  to  assure  her  that 
her  confidence  in  his  honor  was  not  misplaced,  has  an 
air  of  genuine  feeling  in  it. 

Love-letters,  however,  scarcely  bear  resurrection 
after  a  burial  of  some  hundred  and  thirty  years.  We 
are  disposed  to  think  that  Suzanne  Curchod' s  love  for 
Gibbon  was  more  serious  than  his  affection  for  her.  At 
any  rate,  it  is  a  comfort  to  know  that  both  recovered 
sufficiently  to  become  friends  in  after  life.  In  1790, 
when  the  deckers  had  fled  from  France  to  Switzerland, 


318  THE   MOTHER   OF   MADAME   DE   STA£L. 

and  at  Lausanne  Gibbon  was  then  living,  M.  Necker 
was  in  great  dejection,  not  only  at  the  loss  of  place  and 
power,  but  at  the  feelings  of  animosity  shown  him  by 
the  other  French  exiles.  The  JNeckers  became  Gib- 
bon's chief  friends  so  long  as  he  remained  in  Switzer- 
land. They  lived  at  Coppet,  within  easy  distance  of 
Lausanne,  and  their  interchange  of  visits  was  frequent. 
Madame  Necker  w^rote  to  him  frequently,  as  if  to  show 
that  the  wound  in  her  heart  was  healed,  and  that  his 
treatment  of  her  was  forgiven.  "  You  have  always 
been  dear  to  me,"  she  %\Tites,  "  but  the  friendshij)  you 
have  shown  to  M.  Necker  adds  to  that  you  inspire  me 
with  on  so  many  grounds,  and  I  love  you  at  present 
with  a  double  affection.  .  .  .  Come  to  us  when  you  are 
restored  to  health  and  to  yourself  ;  that  moment  should 
always  belong  to  your  first  and  your  last  friend,  and 
I  do  not  know  which  of  those  titles  is  dearest  to  my 
heart.  .  .  Near  you,  the  recollections  you  recalled 
were  pleasant  to  me,  and  you  connected  them  easily 
mth  present  impressions  ;  the  chain  of  years  seemed 
to  link  all  times  together  with  electrical  rapidity  :  you 
were  at  once  twenty  and  fifty  years  old  for  me.  Away 
from  you,  the  different  places  which  I  have  inhabited 
are  only  the  milestones  of  my  life  telling  me  of  the  dis- 
tance I  have  come." 

It  was  during  his  visits  to  the  Neckers  that  Gibbon 
became  acquainted  with  the  future  Madame  de  Stael, 
their  daughter.  As  a  child  she  was  so  fond  of  Gibbon 
that  she  formed  the  innocent  design  of  marrying  him, 
in  order  that  her  parents  might  constantly  enjoj"  the 
pleasure  of  his  company  and  conversation. 

Like  most  brilliant  and  virtuous  women,   Madame 


M.   CORREVON'S   LETTER.  319 

ZS'ecker  was  not  only  a  great  favorite  with  the  literary- 
men  of  Paris  and  Geneva,  after  her  marriage  with  the 
great  financier,  but  she  might  have  chosen  other  suitors 
than  he,  had  she  been  as  frivolous  as  most  girls  of  her 
age.  When  the  news  that  she  was  really  about  to 
marry  M.  Necker,  the  great  banker  of  Paris,  spread 
through  Switzerland,  where  both  he  and  herself  were 
well  known,  she  was  naturally  congratulated  by  all 
her  old  friends.  Among  the  first  to  offer  his  felicita- 
tions was  M.  Moultou.  "  I  resign,"  he  wrote,  "with 
great  pleasure,  into  M.  Necker's  hands  the  sad  office 
of  censor  over  you,  with  which  you  have  kindly 
endowed  me."  Only  one  of  her  old  friends  seems  to 
have  felt  aggrieved — M.  Correvon,  a  lawyer  of  Yverdon. 
She  had  perceived  his  regard  for  her,  and  had  really 
thought  of  him  in  case  her  brilliant  marriage  with  the 
banker  had  never  taken  place.  The  dejected  lawyer 
complained,  x>erhaps  not  wholly  without  reason,  of 
having  been  so  long  fed  upon  false  hopes.  "  I  readily 
IDerceive,"  he  wrote  to  her,  "  with  reason  enough,  that 
you  have  been  regarding  me  only  as  a  miserable  last 
resort,  and  that  you  seized  with  eagerness  the  first 
opportunity  which  presented  itself  of  establishing 
yourself  at  Paris  or  elsewhere."  He  wound  up  his 
disconsolate  letter,  however,  by  saying  :  "  But  why 
trouble  your  joy  with  reminders  of  the  ]3ast.  I  pardon 
you  very  sincerely,  mademoiselle  and  my  dearest 
friend,  all  your  actions,  and  pray  God  to  pour  out 
bountifully  of  His  richest  benedictions  upon  yourself, 
your  dear  husband,  and  all  your  descendants.  I  beg 
of  you  not  to  forget  me  utterly,  and  to  grant  me  a 
friendship  which  may  exempt  me  from  all  caprice.     Be 


320  THE   MOTHER   OF   MADAME   DE    STAEL. 

persuaded  tliat  I  should  esteem  myself  infinitely  happy 
if  opportunity  were  to  occur  when  I  might  give  you 
proofs  of  mine,  which  will  end  only  with  my  life  ;  but 
when  one  has  the  good  fortune  to  marry  a  man  who 
has  thirty -five  thousand  francs  a  year,  one  has  no 
longer  need  of  help  from  anybody.  I  believe  him  to 
be  worthy  of  you,  since  you  have  selected  him.  Enjoy, 
then,  the  happiness  which  Heaven  has  prepared  for 
you  both." 

M.  Necker  seems  to  have  been  an  excellent  husband 
and  most  estimable  man.  Had  he  been  otherwise,  how- 
ever, as  M.  Correvon  with  true  legal  sagacity  say  ■  in 
the  above  letter,  an  income  of  thirty-five  thous  nd 
francs  a  year  places  a  woman  out  of  the  need  of  sym  i- 
tliy,  Suzanne  Curchod  was  well  pleased  with  her  p  i- 
pects,  and  wrote  to  Count  Golowkin  :  "  I  marry  a  i  ..n 
whom  I  would  believe  to  be  an  angel  if  his  attachmc  nt 
to  myself  did  not  prove  his  weakness." 

The  elderly  bridegroom  himself  was  not  less  en- 
tented.  "  Yes,  sir,' '  he  writes  to  Moultou,  in  acknc  .vl- 
edgment  of  his  congratulations,  "  your  friend  as 
accepted  me,  and  I  believe  myself  as  happy  as  a  man 
can  be.  I  do  not  understand  how  you  yourself  are  to 
be  congratulated,  unless  it  should  be  as  my  friend. 
Will  money,  then,  always  control  opinion  ?  It  is  a 
shame.  Does  not  he  who  gains  a  virtuous,  lovely,  and 
sensible  Avife  make  a  good  affair  of  it,  whether  or  not 
he  be  seated  upon  money-bags  V 

Like  many  of  the  great  bankers  of  London,  Antwerp, 
and  other  cities,  the  house  of  Thellusson  &  Necker  was 
situated  in  a  narrow  and  obscure  street,  known  as 
Michel-le-Comte  Street.     But  its  extreme  gloom  was 


-T^ 


SUZANNE    NECKER,    THE    MOTHER    OF 
MADAME    DE   STAEL. 


AN   EGOTIST'S   LETTER.  323 

soon  atoned  for  by  its  interior  illumination,  the  first 
men  of  France  and  indeed  of  Europe  delighting  to 
honor  the  Parisian  financier  and  his  "wife  with  their 
company. 

Of  many  who  were  glad  to  avail  themselves  of  this 
hospitality  and  of  more  substantial  favors  at  the  hands 
of  the  powerful  banker,  there  are  some  whose  compli- 
ments to  the  qualities  of  Madame  Necker  wear  the 
aspect  of  flattery.  We  must  remember,  however,  that 
the  paying  of  compliments  is  natural  to  the  French, 
and  especially  to  the  French  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
Foremost  though  not  greatest  of  these  flatterers  was 
Marmontel,  an  author  of  even  less  money  than  insin- 
cerity. In  the  memoirs  written  by  him,  as  he  says, 
for  the  instruction  of  his  children,  we  find  a  constant 
reference  to  Madame  Necker.  As  a  specimen  of 
French  egotism,  his  account  of  their  first  meeting  is 
delightful.  "  It  was  at  a  town  ball,"  he  writes,  "  quite 
a  singular  circumstance  that  I  made  Madame  Necker's 
acquaintance  ;  she  was  then  young,  and  quite  pretty, 
with  a  dazzlingly  fresh  complexion,  dancing  badly, 
but  with  all  her  heart.  Hardly  had  she  heard  my 
name  pronounced  when  she  came  up  to  me  with  a  naive 
air  of  joy.  '  In  coming  to  Paris,'  she  said  to  me,  '  one 
of  my  desires  was  to  become  acquainted  with  the 
author  of  "  Moral  Tales."  I  little  thought  to  be  so 
fortunate  as  to  meet  you  at  this  ball.  .  .  .  Necker,' 
said  she,  calling  her  husband  to  her  side,  '  come  and 
help  me  to  induce  Mr.  Marmontel,  the  author  of 
'•Moral  Tales,"  to  do  us  the  honor  of  coming  to  see 
us.'  M.  ]^J"ecker  was  very  civil  in  his  invitation,  and 
I  accepted  it."     In  return  for  all  favors  bestowed  upon 


324  THE  MOTPIER  OF  MADAME  DE   STA^L. 

liim  and  liis  family  by  M.  Necker,  Marmontel  wrote 
poems  in  i^raise  of  Madame  Necker,  as  lie  did  subse- 
quently of  lier  daughter,  the  future  Madame  de  Stacl. 
Madame  Necker  replied  in  verses  of  more  point  than 
his  own,  but  those  of  neither  are  worth  quoting,  being- 
gilt  rather  than  gold,  like  most  others  of  that  gilded  age. 

Friday  evening  in  each  week  was  the  occasion  of  the 
famous  receptions  in    the  salon  of  INladauie   Necker. 

The  Abbe  Morellet,  another  of  the  Comptroller- 
GeneraFs  mendicants,  was  a  constant  attendant,  as  was 
the  Abbe  Raynal.  A  more  distinguished  guest  than 
any  of  these  was  the  famous  Grimm,  whom  INIadame 
d'Epinay's  memoirs  and  his  own  literary  correspond- 
ence, esx>ecially  with  Catharine  of  Russia,  have  pre- 
served in  literature  to  our  own  day.  He  was  one  of 
the  famous  dinner-party  at  which  seventeen  sat  down 
at  Madame  Necker' s  table,  and  proposed  to  erect  a 
statue  to  Voltaire  by  public  subscrij^tion.  Grimm 
cherished  some  grudge  against  Madame  Necker  on 
account  of  her  religious  opinions,  the  sincerity  of 
which  he  doubted.  "  Hyixitia  Necker,''  he  wrote,  in 
speaking  of  her  "  System  of  Nature,"  "  passes  her 
life  with  freethinkers,  but  is  devout  after  a  fashion  of 
her  own.  She  would  like  to  be  sincerely  Huguenot, 
or  Socinian,  or  Deistic  rather  ;  for  the  sake  of  being 
something  she  assumes  to  be  responsible  for  nothing." 
After  one  of  their  little  controversies,  and  in  reply  to 
a  letter  from  Madame  Necker,  Grimm,  however,  tells 
her  that  she  has  made  him  shed  tears  like  a  child,  and 
disavows  the  thought  of  censuring  her  for  her  views. 
The  letters  of  Grimm  to  Madame  Necker  are  among 
the  best  in  her  correspondence.     During  the  whole  of 


LETTER   FllO.M   GlilMM.  325 

his  long  journey  into  Prussia  and  Russia  in  comx)any 
with  Diderot,  Grimm  wrote  to  her  constantly.  He 
writes  to  her  from  St.  Petersburg,  from  Catharine's 
court,  giving  her  all  the  news,  and  she  sends  him  in 
return  all  that  is  passing  in  Paris.  Ilis  admiration  for 
the  character  of  the  Russian  Empress  is  as  strange  as 
it  is  evidently  genuine,  and  in  one  of  his  letters  to 
Madame  Necker  he  says  :  ''I  am  perhaps  the  only 
person  in  the  world  who  knows  distinctly  the  secret  of 
her  reign,  employed  entirely  to  undermine  the  founda- 
tions of  despotism,  and  in  time  to  give  to  her  people 
the  sentiment  of  liberty.  I  say  in  time,  because  it  is 
no  more  possible  to  force  this  precious  fruit  than  any 
other.  Whether  her  project  succeed  or  whether  it  be 
interrupted  and  annihilated  after  her,  it  will  be  none 
the  less  known  when  she  shall  be  no  more,  and  there 
will  come  a  time  when  some  sensible  man  will  be  not  a 
little  struck  with  the  extreme  resemblance  of  her 
system  of  government  to  tliat  of  M.  Necker.  The  jjlan 
of  dividing  the  empire  into  twenty-two  governments, 
which  she  conceived  twelve  years  ago,  which  she  has 
systematically  pursued,  executed,  and  perfected,  with 
a  constancy  and  wisdom  with  no  i^arallel,  indepen- 
dently of  the  advantage  of  attaching  men  of  all  orders, 
by  their  functions,  to  public  affairs,  and  making 
citizens  out  of  subjects,  has  had  no  other  aim  than  that 
,  which  M.  Xecker  fjroposed  to  himself  to  effect,  by  the 
establishment  of  provincial  assemblies.  Her  project 
realized  has  made  no  noise,  because  it  is  carried  out  in 
the  midst  of  a  nation  not  yet  practised  in  calculating 
the  moral  consequences  of  a  political  ojjeration  ;  but 
the  time  will  come  when  this  coincident  action  on  the 


32G  THE   MOTHER   OF   MADAME    DE   STAEL. 

part  of  two  minds  charged  with  governmentai  admin- 
istration, at  two  snch  distant  points,  will  strike  with 
astonishment." 

Diderot,  another  frequenter  of  Madame  decker's 
salon,  but  a  less  faithful  correspondent  with  her  when 
absent  than  his  friend  Grimm,  has  himself  narrated,  in 
one  of  his  letters  to  Mile.  Yoland,  the  circumstances  of 
their  first  acquaintance:  "Do  you  know  what  good 
reason  I  have  for  being  vain  'I  There  is  a  Madame 
Xecker  here,  a  pretty  woman  and  a  wit,  who  dotes  upon 
me.  I  am  actually  persecuted  to  go  to  her  house.  .  .  . 
She  was  a  portionless  young  Genevan,  to  whom  the 
banker  Necker  has  recently  given  an  enviable  posi- 
tion. Somebody  said,  '  Do  you  believe  that  a  woman 
who  owes  everything  to  her  husband  would  dare  to  be 
untrue  to  him  ? '  Somebody  answered,  '  jN'othing  is 
more  ungrateful  in  the  world.'  I  was  the  rascal  who 
made  that  answer.     The  question  was  about  woman." 

Diderot  had  a  coarse  mind  where  women  were  con- 
cerned, but  he  lived  to  correct  his  misinterpretation  of 
Madame  Keeker's  friendships  with  men,  and  called  her 
"  a  woman  who  possesses  all  that  the  purity  of  an 
angelic  soul  adds  to  fineness  of  taste."  At  her  salon 
he  represented  brilliantly  the  coterie  of  the  Encyclo- 
paedists. Another  of  these  infidel  friends  of  hers  was 
Voltaire,  and  another  D'Alembert. 

It  cannot  be  wondered  at  that  her  early  friends,  who 
had  known  her  pious  parentage  and  training,  should 
feel  alarm  when  her  society  became  courted  by  the 
Encyclopaedists.  Her  great  friend  Moultou  expressed 
great  anxiety  on  her  account  but  she  hastened  to  reas- 
sure him  in  the  following  letter  : 


HER   LITERARY   FRIENDS.  327 

''My  dear  Friend:  Can  you  suspect  me  for  an 
instant  ?  I  received  my  sentiments  with  my  ex- 
istence, and  would  you  have  me  abandon  them  at 
the  time  when  my  happiness  is  the  fruit  of  them  ? 
You  may  charge  me  with  enthusiasip,  but  is  it  you 
who  are  to  comj)lain  of  my  worshipjoing  all  that  is 
good  ?  I  see  some  literary  men,  but  as  I  have  made 
haste  to  show  them  what  my  princix^les  are,  they  never 
touch  upon  that  subject  in  my  presence.  At  my 
age,  with  an  agreeable  home,  nothing  is  so  easy  as 
to  give  tone.  ...  I  live,  it  is  true,  in  the  midst  of 
a  great  number  of  atheists,  but  their  arguments  have 
never  touched  my  mind,  and  if  they  have  at  all  come 
in  contact  with  my  heart,  they  have  only  caused  it  to 
shudder  with  horror.-'  On  another  occasion  she  said, 
''  I  have  atheist  friends,  but  why  not  ?  They  are  so 
unhappy." 

Among  other  literary  friends  of  Madame  Necker,  the 
names  of  Buff  on  and  Thomas  must  not  be  omitted. 
The  former  was  the  well-known  author  of  the 
"  Natural  History,"  and  was  thirty  years  the  senior  of 
Madame  Necker.  She  was  present  at  his  death-bed, 
and  it  was  a  great  consolation  to  her,  in  that  age  of  in- 
fidelity, to  hear  from  his  lips  a  firm  confession  in  Jesus 
Christ  as  the  Divine  Saviour  of  mankind.  He  be- 
queathed to  her  in  his  will  the  porcelain  tea-service 
which  had  been  presented  to  him  by  Prince  Henry, 
and  which  had  always  had  a  great  value  in  his  eyes. 
In  her  journal,  some  months  after  his  death,  is  an 
entry  which  says  that  the  spectacle  of  his  last  suffer- 
ings will  ever  be  present  to  her  heart  and  mind,  and 
that  he  had  showed    her  the    nothingness  of  great 


328  THE   MOTHER   OF   MADAME   DE    STAEL. 

talents  ;  that  man  is  nothing,  God  all,  and  that  it  is  in 
His  bosom  we  must  seek  an  asylum  against  our  own 
thoughts. 

Her  friendshii?  with  M.  Thomas  was  not  less  honor- 
able to  both.  It  was  an  interchange  of  high  and  sym- 
pathetic thoughts  for  a  period  of  twenty  years,  and 
when  he  died,  at  the  comparatively  early  age  of  fifty, 
Madame  Necker  felt  the  loss  profoundly.  Bat  again 
she  was  consoled  by  the  knowledge  that  he  turned  to 
religion  to  solve  the  mysteries  of  life,  and  that  he  died 
in  the  hope  of  a  blessed  immortality. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  because  the  position  of 
her  husband  made  her  salon  frequented  chiefly  by  brill- 
iant men  of  letters  and  politics  that  Madame  Necker 
neglected  the  friendship  of  her  own  sex.  On  the  con- 
trary, she  was  on  intimate  terms  with  such  women  as 
Madame  Geoflfrin,  Madame  du  Deffand,  Madame 
d'Houdetot,  and  others  of  the  most  famous  women  in 
the  society  of  that  time. 

In  her  public  life  we  find  the  life  of  France  and  of 
Europe  at  the  most  critical  period  of  the  eighteenth 
century  reflected.  In  her  corresi^ondence,  we  find  in- 
deed some  contagion  of  the  frivolity  of  that  age,  but 
none  of  its  wickedness.  She  won  the  respect  even  of 
men  who  were  not  accustomed  to  respect  women  in 
that  dissolute  age.  There  is  not  a  sign  that  she 
cherished  animosities,  or  was  other  than  a  good  woman 
and  a  good  wife.  If  her  conversation  was  less  brilliant 
than  that  of  her  daughter,  Madame  De  Stael,  it  has  the 
greater  charm  of  sincerity  and  perpetual  hopefulness. 


THE  MOTHER  AND  WIFE  OF  SHAKSPEARE. 

Yeky  little  is  known  either  of  Mary  Arden.  tlie 
mother,  or  of  Anne  Hathaway,  the  wife  of  Shakspeare. 
That  the  former  must  have  exercised  a  powerful  influ- 
ence upon  the  mind  of  the  future  poet,  playwright,  and 
actor  is  certain.  In  a  small  sequestered  village  like 
Stratford-on-Avon,  the  child  would  necessarily  be 
under  the  constant  supervision  and  influence  of  his 
j)arents.  We  know  that  they  were  persons  of  con- 
siderable local  importance,  for  his  father  rose  to  the 
chief  local  magistracy.  His  mother  is  said  to  have 
been  of  gentle  birth,  and  they  were  no  doubt  persons 
of  information  and  reflection,  for  the  times  in  which 
they  lived  were  freighted  with  events  that  must  have 
compelled  every  one  to  think,  read,  and  form  decided 
opinions.     They  were  "  times  that  tried  men's  souls." 

Shakspeare  was  born  in  the  sixth  year  of  the  reign 
of  Queen  Elizabeth.  He  was  the  eldest  son,  but  the 
third  child.  His  parents  must  have  married  not  later 
than  the  year  1557,  two  years  after  Cranmer  was 
burned  at  the  stake.  Two  hundred  martyrs  had  died 
for  the  Protestant  religion  in  Mary's  reign.  The  very 
atmosphere  of  England  must  have  been  impregnated 
^^'ith  theological  controversy.  There  were  many  trans- 
lations of  the  Bible  extant  in  England.  They  would 
have  been  hidden  during  the  reign  of  Mary,  but 
brought  to  light  again  in  that  of  her  Protestant  sister. 


330  THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF    SHAKSPEARE. 

As  that  reign  advanced,  Protestantism  grew  stronger, 
and  became  more  firmly  rooted  all  over  the  country. 
It  was  the  religion  of  the  Queen,  who  showed  her  skill 
and  knowledge  of  the  Scriptures  when  arguing  with 
Bonner,  Bishop)  of  London  ;  Gardiner,  Bishop)  of  Win- 
chester ;  Tonstall,  Bishop  of  Durham,  and  other  Poi)ish 
prelates  even  before  her  accession  to  the  throne.  Her 
Parliament  was  Protestant.  The  Queen  and  Parlia- 
ment together  made  the  Reformed  Church  of  England 
the  state  religion  of  the  country,  as  it  had  been  in  the 
latter  days  of  Henry  the  Eighth,  and  throughout  the 
brief  reign  of  Edward  the  Sixth.  It  is  impossible  that 
John  and  Mary  Shakspeare  should  have  been  uninflu- 
enced by  the  English  Reformation,  even  if  they  did  not 
conform  to  the  Protestant  Church  of  England. 

But  there  is  good  evidence,  although  only  of  a  nega- 
tive character,  that  they  were  both  of  them  attached 
members  of  the  Protestant  established  religion.  If 
they  had  not  been  so,  John  Shakspeare  would  not 
have  been  elected  or  appointed  to  the  mayoralty  of 
Stratford-on-Avon.  If  they  had  not  been  so,  they 
would  not  have  been  acquainted  with  the  English 
Bible.  But  if  they  were  not  acquainted  with  that 
pearl  of  great  price,  as  it  was  then  accounted  by  the 
masses  of  the  English  people,  how  sliall  we  account  for 
the  remarkable  knowledge  of  the  Bible  which  their 
illustrous  son  shows  in  his  writings  ?  If  there  was  no 
"  open  vision"  of  the  Bible  in  his  father's  house  at 
Stratford-on-Avon,  how,  when,  and  where  could  he 
have  acquired  a  familiarity,  not  only  with  its  text  but 
with  its  innermost  thoughts,  which  has  perplexed  the 
commentators  and  put  theologians  to  the  blush  ?     He 


MARY   ARDEN'S   TEACHINGS.  331 

certainly  could  not  acquire  it  when  playing  at  the 
theatres  in  Blackfriars.  Such  knowledge  is  part  of 
the  web  and  woof  of  Shakspeare's  plays,  and  it  could 
not  have  been  acquired  except  in  early  years,  when 
his  mind  first  opened  to  the  reception  of  the  beautiful, 
the  awful,  and  the  sublime. 

We  are  therefore  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  the 
parents  of  Shakspeare  were  Protestant  Church  peo- 
ple, devout  students  of  the  Word  of  God,  the  entrance 
of  whose  truths  into  the  human  mind  never  fails  to  fill 
it  \\ath  light  and  understanding.  And  if  this  theory 
be  correct — and  there  is  nothing  to  contradict  it,  but 
everything  in  its  favor — then  we  indulge  no  fancy,  but 
a  legitimate  reason  and  imagination,  when  we  picture 
Shakspeare  as  a  child  at  his  mother,  Mary  Arden's 
knee,  learning  from  her  gentle  lips  the  noble  precepts 
and  the  deep  philosophy  of  the  sacred  Volume. 
George  MacDonald,  in  his  recent  work,  "  The  Imagina- 
tion and  Other  Essays,"  takes  this  view,  though  it  is 
not  original  in  his  pages  any  more  than  in  our  own. 
In  an  admirable  little  essay  on  Shakspeare,  he  considers 
the  chief  events  that  occurred  in  England  during  his 
earlier  life,  the  writers  who  flourished,  the  books  to  be 
met  with,  and  the  influence  which  these  circumstances 
would  have  respectively  exercised  upon  the  poet's 
mind.  "  And  here,"  he  says,  "  an  interesting  question 
occurs  :  Was  it  in  part  to  his  mother  that  Shakspeare 
was  indebted  for  that  profound  knowledge  of  the  Bible 
which  is  so  evident  in  his  writings  V  A  good  many 
copies  of  the  Scriptures  must  have  been  by  this  time,  in 
one  translation  or  another,  scattered  over  the  country. 
No  doubt  the  Word  was  precious  in  those  days  and 


332  THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   SHAKSPEARE. 

hard  to  buy  ;  but  there  might  have  been  a  copy,  not- 
■udthstanding,  in  the  house  of  John  Shakspeare,  and  it 
is  possible  that  it  was  from  his  mother"  s  lips  that  the 
boy  first  heard  the  Scripture  tales.  We  have  called 
his  acquaintance  with  Scripture  profound^  and  one 
peculiar  way  in  which  it  manifests  itself  will  bear  out 
the  assertion,  for  frequently  it  is  the  very  spirit  and 
essential  aroma  of  the  passage  that  he  reproduces,  with- 
out making  any  use  of  the  words  themselves.  There 
are  passages  in  his  writings  which  we  could  not  have 
understood  but  for  some  acquaintance  with  the  New 
Testament."  And  he  goes  on  to  produce  specimens 
from  the  single  play  of  Macbeth. 

The  phrase  "  temple  haunting  martlet"  (Act  I.,  Scene 
6)  has  reference,  in  George  MacDonald's  judgment  and 
in  ours,  to  the  verse  in  the  Psalms  :  "  Yea,  the  sparrow 
hath  found  an  house,  and  the  swallow  a  nest  for  her- 
self, where  she  may  lay  her  young,  even  thine  altars, 
O  Lord  of  Hosts." 

Macbeth,  on  his  way  to  murder  Duncan,  says  : 

"  Thou  sure  and  firm-set  earth, 
Hear  iiot  my  steps,  which  way  they  walk,  for  fear 
Thy  very  stones  prate  of  my  whereabout, 
And  take  the  present  horror  from  the  time 
Which  now  suits  with  it." 

''  What  is  meant,"  asks  this  divine  and  novelist,  "  by 
the  last  two  lines  \  It  seems  to  us  to  be  just  another 
form  of  the  words,  '  For  there  is  nothing  covered,  that 
shall  not  be  revealed  ;  neither  liid,  that  shall  not  be 
known.  Therefore,  whatsoever  ye  have  sj)oken  in 
darkness  shall  be  heard  in  the  light ;  and  that  which  ye 


BIBLE   INFLUENCES.  333 

have  spoken  in  the  ear  in  closets  shall  be  proclaimed 
upon  the  housetops.'  Of  course  we  do  not  mean  that 
Macbeth  is  represented  as  having  this  passage  in  his 
mind,  but  that  Shakspeare  had  the  feeling  of  them 
when  he  wrote  thus.  What  Macbeth  means  is,  '  Earth, 
do  not  hear  me  in  the  dark,  which  is  suitable  to  the 
present  horror,  lest  the  very  stones  prate  about  it  in 
the  daylight,  which  is  not  suitable  to  such  things  ; 
thus  taking  the  present  horror  from  the  time  which 
now  suits  with  it. ' 

"  Again,  in  the  only  piece  of  humor  in  the  play — if 
that  should  be  called  humor  which,  taken  in  its  rela- 
tion to  the  consciousness  of  the  principal  characters,  is 
as  terrible  as  anything  in  the  j^iece — the  porter  ends 
off  his  fantastic  soliloquy,  in  which  he  personates  the 
porter  of  hell-gate,  with  the  words,  '  But  this  place  is 
too  cold  for  hell ;  I'll  devil-porter  it  no  further.  I  had 
thought  to  Tiave  let  in  some  of  all  professions,  that  go 
the  primrose  way  to  the  everlasting  bonfire.'  Now 
what  else  had  the  writer  in  his  mind  but  the  verse 
from  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  '  For  wide  is  the  gate, 
and  broad  is  the  way,  that  leadeth  to  destruction,  and 
many  there  be  which  go  in  thereat '  ? 

"  It  may  be  objected  that  such  passages  as  these, 
being  of  the  most  commonly  quoted,  imply  no  pro- 
found acquaintance  with  Scripture,  such  as  we  have 
said  Shakspeare  possessed.  But  no  amount  of  knowl- 
edge of  the  words  of  the  Bible  would  be  sufficient  to 
justify  the  use  of  the  word  profound.  What  is  re- 
markable in  the  employment  of  these  passages  is  not 
merely  that  they  are  so  present  to  his  mind  that  they 
come  up  for  use  in  the  most  exciting  moments  of  com- 


334  THE   MOTHER   AND    WIFE   OP   SHAKSPEARE. 

position,  but  that  he  embodies  the  spirit  of  them  in 
such  a  new  form  as  reveals  to  minds  saturated  and 
deadened  with  the  sound  of  the  words,  the  very  visual 
image  and  spiritual  meaning  involved  in  them.  '  The 
primrose  way  ! '     And  to  what  ? 

"  We  will  confine  ourselves  to  one  passage  more  : 

"  'Madteth.     So  ripe  for  shaking,  and  the  powers  above 
Put  on  their  instruments.' 

"  In  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  chapter  of  the  Revela- 
tion we  have  the  words,  '  Thrust  in  thy  sickle,  and 
reap ;  for  the  time  is  come  for  thee  to  reap  ;  for  the 
harvest  of  the  earth  is  ripe.'  We  suspect  that  Shak- 
speare  wrote  '  ripe  to  shaking.' 

**  But  there  is  one  singular  correspondence  in  another 
almost  literal  quotation  from  the  gosx)el,  which  is 
wonderfullv  interesting.  We  are  told  that  the  words 
'  eye  of  a  needle,"*  in  the  passage  about  a  rich  man 
entering  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  mean  the  small 
side-entrance  in  a  city  gate.  Now,  in  Ricliard  II., 
Act  v.,  Scene  5,  Richard  quotes  the  passage  thus  : 

"  'It's  hard  to  come  as  for  a  camel 

To  thread  the  portion  of  a  needle's  eye  ; ' 

showing  that  either  the  imagination  of  Shakspeare 
suggested  the  real  explanation,  or  that  he  had  taken 
pains  to  acquaint  himself  with  the  significance  of  the 
simile.  We  can  hardly  say  that  the  correspondence 
might  be  merely  fortuitous ;  because,  at  the  last. 
Shakspeare  looked  for  and  found  a  suitable  figure  to 
associate  with  the  words  eye  of  a  needle^  and  so  fell 
upon  the  real  exjilanation  ;  except,  indeed,  he  had  no 


SHAKSPEARE'S   PLAYS.  335 

particular  significance  in  using  the  word  that  meant  a 
I'tttle  gate,  instead  of  a  word  meaning  any  kind  of 
entrance,  which,  with  him,  seems  unlikely." 

That  Shakspeare,  beside  being  what  his  friend  Ben 
Jonson  called  him,  "  indeed  honest,  and  of  an  open 
and  free  nature,"  was  a  Christian  in  the  gospel  meaning 
of  the  word,  there  is  every  reason  to  believe.  In  his  last 
will  and  testament  he  says,  "  I  commend  my  soul  into 
the  hands  of  God,  my  Creator  ;  hoping  and  assuredly 
believing,  through  the  only  merits  of  Jesus  Christ,  my 
Saviour,  to  be  made  partaker  of  life  everlasting." 
This  is  the  language  of  a  man  who  beneath  all  his  jests 
and  laughter  had  faith  in  God.  While,  however,  it  is 
certain  that  the  mind  of  Shakspeare  was  imbued  with 
the  sublime  truths  of  the  Bible  through  one  of  the 
translations  which  X)receded  the  King  James  author- 
ized translations  of  1611,  it  is  probable  that  these  last- 
named  translators  owed  quite  as  much  to  Shakspeare, 
or  rather  far  more,  than  he  owed  to  them.  According 
to  the  accepted  chronological  order  of  Shakspeare' s 
plays,  only  two  of  them  were  written  after  1611  ;  all 
the  rest  having  been  composed  in  the  interval  between 
that  year  and  1591.  The  Bibles  most  commonly  used 
during  that  period  were  either  Parker  s,  called  also  the 
Bishops'  Bible,  of  1568,  required  to  be  used  in 
churches  ;  or  various  reprints  of  the  Geneva  Bible  of 
1560,  with  short  marginal  notes,  and  muc'i  used  in 
private  families  (a  translation  which  was  due  in  part  to 
John  Knox,  while  resident  abroad);  or  the  version  by 
the  Roman  Catholics,  of  the  New  Testament,  pub- 
lished at  Rheims,  in  1582,  and  of  the  whole  Bible  at 
Douay,  in  1609. 


336  THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   SHAKSPEaRE. 

The  whole  subject  of  "  Shakspeare  and  the  Bible" 
has  been  exhaustively  treated  by  the  learned  Bishop 
of  St.  Andrew's,  Dr.  Charles  Wordsworth,  who  brings 
out  all  the  allusions  in  Shakspeare  to  the  historical 
facts  and  characters  of  the  Bible,  and  wdio  traces  the 
religious  sentiments  and  principles  of  the  immortal 
jioet  on  all  subjects  connected  with  religion,  from  the 
Being  and  !N"ature  of  God  to  the  intermediate  state 
and  the  Day  of  Judgment,  to  the  influence  which  the 
Bible  had  uj)on  him.  It  has  been  well  said  that 
"  Shakspeare's  moral  philosophy  is  Christianity  -pn- 
rified  from  everything  exaggerated  or  equivocal."' 
"  We  are  apt,"  says  Mrs.  Montagu,  in  her  celebrated 
essay,  "  to  consider  Shakspeare  only  as  a  poet,  but  he 
is  certainly  one  of  the  greatest  moral  philosophers 
that  ever  lived.  Bishop  Charles  Wordsworth — for  his 
brother,  Dr.  Christopher  Wordsworth,  is  Lord  Bishoj) 
of  Lincoln,  and  both  of  them  are  nephews  of  the  poet 
William  Wordsworth,  who  acknowledged  Shakspeare 
as  the  supreme  master  of  English  poetry — asks, 
'  Whence  did  he  become  such  ? '  I  answer  without 
hesitation,  because,  while  he  possessed  the  keenest 
natural  powers  of  observation,  together  with  an  unfail- 
ing spirit  of  gentleness  and  love  and  universal  sym- 
})atliy,  he  drew  his  philosoiihy  from  the  highest  and 
purest  source  of  moral  truth."  In  like  manner.  Dr. 
Johnson  has  observed,  that  from  the  writings  of 
Shakspeare,  tcJio  loolzed  tliroiujli  life  in  all  its  rela- 
tions, public  and  j^i'ivate,  "  a  system  of  social  duty 
may  be  selected." 

James  Anthony  Froude,  the  historian,  in  his  book 
on  John  Bunyan,  has  said  :   "  The  Bible,   thoroughly 


HIS   MOTHERS   TEACHINGS.  337 

known,  is  a  literature  of  itself — the  rarest  and  ricliest 
in  all  departments  of  thought  or  imagination  that  ex- 
ists." Lord  Macaulay  speaks  of  "  our  noble  transla- 
tion of  the  Bible"  as  "  a  book  from  the  authority  of 
which  there  is  no  appeal,  where  the  question  is  about 
the  force  of  an  English  word,"  In  his  youth  Shak- 
speare  was  not  acquainted  with  this  translation,  but  he 
was  with  one  or  other  of  the  versions  that  preceded  it ; 
and  as  it  is  the  profound  thoughts  rather  than  the  pre- 
cise words  of  the  Bible  that  are  so  unmistakably  visible 
in  his  plays,  we  may  well  accept  the  belief  that  John 
Shaksx)eare  his  father,  the  well-to-do  glover  of  Strat- 
ford, and  Mary  Arden  his  mother,  taught  him  from 
a  child  those  holy  Scriptures  which  have  done  more  to 
unfold  the  literary  genius  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  than  all 
other  influences  put  together.  Having  examined  the 
evidence  for  this  theory,  imagination  must  All  in  the 
picture.  To  our  mind  it  is  a  most  pleasing  and  beautiful 
picture,  that  of  the  greatest  genius  of  England  learn- 
ing in  childhood  from  his  mother  that  new  and  sacred 
wisdom  which  was  then  spreading  over  England  and 
emancipating  the  minds  of  its  people.  How  serene 
a  light  his  mother's  teaching  from  the  book  of  books 
may  have  shed  upon  his  future  life  we  can  but  con- 
jecture. Of  his  personal  history  we  know  but  little, 
and  we  are  not  sure  even  of  the  day  of  his  birth.  But 
we  do  know  the  day  of  his  baptism  and  of  his  death. 
He  was  born  in  April,  1564,  at  Stratford-on-Avon,  in 
Warwickshii^e,  and  he  died  at  the  same  place  on  the 
28th  of  April,  1616,  when  he  was  only  in  his  fifty- 
third  year.  He  married  very  youno;,  before  he  was  . 
nineteen,  Anne  Hathaway,  a  yeoman's  daughter,  eight 


338  THE   MOTHER    AND   WIFE   OF   SHAKSPEARE. 

years  older  than  himself,  who  survived  him  seven 
years,  dj'ing  in  1623,  at  the  age  of  sixty-seven.  In 
that  same  year  appeared  the  tirst  edition  of  his  col- 
lected plays,  thirty-five  in  number,  which  are  generally 
allowed  to  be  genuine  ;  though  not  more  than  fourteen 
(or  sixteen,  including  Titus  Andronicus  and  Pericles^ 
Prince  of  Tyre)  had  been  published  in  his  lifetime. 
There  is  good  reason  to  believe  that  a  great  portion  of 
what  he  wrote  was  composed,  not  perhaps  under  the 
actual  pressure  of  want,  but  under  unfavorable  circum- 
stances. He  left  his  family  in  Stratford  when  he  went 
to  London,  but  he  visited  them  every  year  and  spent  his 
last  year  wholly  in  their  company.  His  real  personal 
existence  can  never,  like  that  of  Homer,  be  doubted  or 
explained  away.  AVe  know  the  names  of  his  parents, 
his  wife,  and  his  children.  We  know  that  he  lost  his 
only  son,  when  that  son  was  only  a  boy  in  his  twelfth 
year.  As  Shakspeare  is  proved  by  his  annual  visits 
and  final  retirement  to  Stratford  to  have  been  a  man  of 
strong  local  attachments,  so  there  is  every  reason  to 
believe  that  he  was  of  strong  domestic  affections. 
How  far  Anne  Hathaway,  his  senior  in  age,  was  a  help- 
meet for  him  we  cannot  tell,  for  we  know  nothing  of 
her  except  that  her  husband  bequeathed  to  her  in  his 
will  his  second  best  bedstead.  But  we  know  that  he 
provided  both  for  her  and  for  their  children,  that  he 
lived  to  relieve  his  father,  who  at  one  time  did  not  dare 
even  to  go  to  church  for  fear  of  arrest  for  debt,  from 
financial  distress  in  his  old  age.  "  As  if  unconscious 
of  his  superiority,  he  was  as  open  and  unassuming  as  a 
child.""  Perhaps  his  mother's  teachings  out  of  the 
!New  Testament,  about  becoming  as  little  children  and 


A   CiODFATHER.  33& 

SO  entering  the  kingdom  of  God,  had  something  to  do 
with  this  transparent  candor  of  his  soul.  Twelve  years, 
after  the  loss  of  his  own  son,  Shakspeare  stood  beside 
the  fount  in  Trinity  Church,  Stratford-on-Avon,  as 
godfather  to  William  Walker,  infant  son  of  a  neighbor, 
baptized  October  16th,  1608.  Perhaps  he  was  named 
William,  after  Shakspeare  himself,  for,  as  he  writes  in 
Love' s  Lahor'  s  Lost  (Act  I.,  Scene  4), 

"Every  godfather  can  give  a  name." 

He  made  provision  for  this  godchild  in  his  will,  per- 
haps feeling  for  him  somewhat  of  the  affection  he  had 
felt  for  the  only  son  whom  he  had  lost.  There  are  in- 
dications that  he  felt  that  son's  death  acutely,  yet  Ms 
character  forbids  us  to  think  that  he  lost  his  habitual 
serenity  of  mind  or  sorrowed  as  one  that  had  no  hope 
of  reunion.  In  King  John,  the  play  that  he  wrote  in 
the  same  year,  or,  as  others  have  supposed,  two  years 
after  that  bereavement,  the  Lady  Constance  is  made  ta 
utter  that  affecting  speech  : 

*'  Grief  fills  the  room  up  of  my  absent  child, 
Lies  in  his  bed,  walks  up  and  down  with  me 
Puts  on  his  pretty  looks,  repeats  his  words, 
Remembers  me  of  all  his  gracious  parts." 

Who  knows  but  that  Shakspeare  when  he  wTote  these 
lines  was  musing  tenderly  upon  the  dear  boy  who  had 
been  taken  from  him  in  his  twelfth  year  'i  And  that 
there  entered  into  these  tender  memories  of  the  loving 
father  the  Christian's  hope  of  seeing  him  again  in  the 
bright  home  where  parting  and  sorrow  are  no  more, 
we  may  judge  from  the  words  he  puts  into  the  mouth 


340    THE  MOTHER  AND  WIFE  OF  SHAKSPEARE. 

of  the  same  Lady  Constance,  then  addressing  the  legate 
of  the  Pope : 

"  Father  Cardinal,  I  have  heard  you  say 
That  we  shall  see  and  know  our  friends  in  heaven  : 
If  that  be  true,  /  shall  nee  my  boy  again. ' ' 

He  who  looked  as  deeply  as  Shakspeare  did  beneath 
the  grave  of  things  must  have  had  this  hope.  He 
loved  the  quiet  scenes  of  nature  as  few  have  loved 
them,  and  he  looked  through  nature  to  nature's  God. 
Mary  Arden  has  no  biography  on  earth,  but  in  heaven 
she  may  have  known  that  the  glorious  visions,  the 
immortal  hopes,  the  patient  faith  which  she  taught 
her  son  out  of  the  English  Bible  made  him  what  he 
was,  the  world's  teacher  of  heavenly  and  eternal  truths, 


THE  MOTHER  OF  BEETHOVEN. 

It  is  a  toucliing  tribute  to  the  goodness  of  a  mother 
when  her  memory  is  preserved  only  in  the  life  of  her 
son.  Such  is  the  case  with  the  mother  of  Ludwig  von 
Beethoven,  whose  lot  in  this  life  was  so  sad  and  lonely 
and  affords  such  a  contrast  to  the  joyous  and  luxurious 
career  of  Mendelssohn.  Musical  genius  has  too  often 
been  accompanied  by  severe  physical  affliction  and 
vicissitudes  of  fortune.  Handel,  as  we  remember,  was 
blind,  and  Mozart  composed  in  sad  experience  his  own 
requiem.  Beethoven  was  born  at  Bonn  in  1770. 
Morbid  sensitiveness,  helpless  melancholy,  and  from 
the  age  of  forty  total  deafness,  were  his  lot  in  life. 
Deliilum  and  death  carried  him  out  of  the  miseries  he 
endured,  at  the  age  of  fifty-seven.  Keenly  susceptible 
to  woman's  sympathy,  he  never  married,  and  perhaps 
this  isolation  and  shyness  made  the  memory  of  his 
mother  dearer  to  him  than  it  might  otherwise  have 
been. 

Of  such  a  genius  as  Beethoven  it  may  be  said  that 
his  beloved  science  and  art  was  a  heavenly  inspiration 
with  him  not  less  than  an  earthly  accomplishment.  A 
great  modern  theologian,  himself  a  musical  composer 
at  an  early  age,  has  beautifully  said  of  music  :  "  It  is 
an  instance  of  an  outward  and  earthly  form,  or  econ- 
omy, under  which  great  wonders  unknown  seem  to  be 
typified.     I  mean  musical  spunds,  as  they  are  exhib- 


343  THE  MOTHER  OF  BEETHOVEN. 

ited  most  perfectly  in  instrumental  harmony.  There 
are  seven  notes  in  the  scale  ;  make  them  fourteen  ; 
yet  what  a  slender  outfit  for  so  vast  an  enterprise  ! 
What  science  brings  so  much  out  of  so  little  ?  Out  of 
what  poor  elements  does  some  great  master  in  it  create 
his  new  world  !  Shall  we  say  that  all  this  exuberant 
inventiveness  is  a  mere  ingenuity  or  trick  of  art,  like 
some  passing  fashion  of  the  day,  without  reality,  with- 
out meaning  ?  We  may  do  so,  .  .  .  yet  is  it  possible 
that  that  inexhaustible  evolution  and  disposition  of 
notes,  so  rich  yet  so  simple,  so  intricate  yet  so  regu- 
lated, so  various  yet  so  majestic,  should  be  a  mere 
sound  which  is  gone  and  perishes  ?  Can  it  be  that  those 
mysterious  stirrings  of  heart,  and  keen  emotions,  and 
strange  yearnings  after  we  know  not  what,  and 
awful  impressions  from  we  know  not  whence,  should 
be  wrought  in  us  by  what  is  unsubstantial,  and  comes 
and  goes,  and  begins  and  ends  in  itself  ?  It  is  not  so  ; 
it  cannot  be.  No  ;  they  have  escaped  from  some 
higher  sphere  ;  they  are  the  outpourings  of  eternal 
harmony  in  the  medium  of  created  sound  ;  they  are 
echoes  from  our  home  ;  they  are  the  voices  of  angels, 
or  the  Magnificat  of  saints,  or  the  living  laws  of  divine 
governance,  or  the  divine  attribiites  ;  something  are 
they  beside  themselves,  which  we  cannot  compass, 
which  we  cannot  utter,  though  mortal  man,  and  he 
perhaps  not  otherwise  distinguished  above  his  fellows, 
has  the  gift  of  eliciting  them." 

Precocity  in  music  differs  from  precocity  in  poetry 
and  other  arts  and  sciences  in  its  earlier  manifestation 
and  more  spontaneous  utterance.  It  seems  to  burst 
even  from  the  untaught  soul  without  effort  and  almost 


MUSIC    A   MEDICINE.  343 

unconsciously.  It  is  partly  imitation,  but  perliaps  not 
more  so  tlian  the  singing  of  birds,  and  while  culture 
does  much  for  it,  it  does  not  originate  in  culture.  This 
is  a  fact  of  which  every  one  is  conscious.  Men  attain 
eminence  in  music  who  have  had  very  little  training, 
and  sometimes  play  the  violin,  the  cornet,  or  the  piano 
by  a  kind  of  instinct  which  is  above  all  rules.  Sensi 
tiveness  of  the  ear  is  the  first  quality  required,  and 
without  it  there  can  be  no  musical  precocity,  yet  when 
the  art  is  perfected,  even  deafness,  as  in  Beethoven's 
later  years,  cannot  deprive  the  musician  of  the  sense 
of  harmony  and  the  happiness  which  it  inspires.  The 
imagination  is  necessary  both  to  original  composition 
and  the  full  enjoyment  of  music,  for  it  is  possible  to 
be  conscious  of  a  false  note,  a  harsh  vibration,  or  an 
exquisite  rhythm  "without  having  any  original  ideas  in 
music.  In  families  we  often  find,  through  the  stupid- 
ity of  parents,  that  an  immense  amount  of  pains  and 
money  is  expended  in  trying  to  make  a  brilliant  musi- 
cian of  one  who  has  no  taste  for  music,  while  another 
child  who  has  it  is  neglected  because  it  does  not  show 
off  the  latent  gift.  Thus  many  children  of  melody 
and  song  never  get  the  op]3ortunity  of  cultivating  their 
aspirations.  Yet  no  talent  is  worthier  of  cultivation, 
for  none  has  done  so  much  to  beautify  and  refine 
human  existence.  According  to  Plato,  the  human  soul 
is  itself  a  harmony. 

Music  is  not  only  a  delight  but  a  medicine.  It  drove 
away  the  melancholy  of  Saul,  and  it  is  still  found 
potent  to  calm  the  excitement  of  insanity.  Among  the 
many  wise  and  true  sayings  which  we  find  in  Martin 
Luther's  "  Table  Talk,"  there  is  nothing  we  can  recall 


344  THE  MOTHER  OF  BEETHOVEN, 

to  mind  finer  than  his  simple  x)raise  of  music.  He  calls 
it  one  of  the  fakest  of  God's  gifts 'to  man,  and  says  that 
"  Satan  hates  it  because  it  drives  away  temptation  and 
evil  thoughts.  The  notes  make  the  words  alive.  It  is 
the  best  refreshment  to  a  troubled  soul ;  the  heart  as 
you  listen  recovers  its  peace.  It  is  a  discipline  too, 
for  it  softens  us  and  makes  us  temperate  and  reason- 
able. I  would  allow  no  man  to  be  a  schoolmaster  who 
cannot  sing,  nor  would  I  let  him  preach  either."  On 
another  occasion  he  said  :  "  I  have  no  pleasure  in  any 
man  who,  like  the  fanatics,  despises  music.  It  is  no 
invention  of  ours.  It  is  a  gift  of  God  to  drive  away 
the  devil  and  make  us  forget  our  anger  and  impurity 
and  pride  and  evil  tempers.  I  place  music  next  to 
theology.  I  can  see  whj-  David  and  all  the  saints  put 
their  divinest  thoughts  into  song." 

What  a  soothing  refreshment  is  music  in  the  domes- 
tic circle  after  a  day  of  toil !  It  is  the  greatest  aid  to 
reflection,  and  calms  down  the  sudden  and  foolish 
hnpulses.  It  is  the  most  tranquillizing  of  all  sedatives  ; 
the  gentlest  of  all  stimulants  ;  the  most  humanizing  of 
all  recreations.  It  is  an  accompaniment  to  wisdom  and 
sheds  light  upon  the  darkness  of  the  soul.  It  is  a 
founder  of  peace  on  earth  and  good-will  among  men. 
For,  though  the  martial  strain  leads  men  to  battle,  the 
psean  of  victory  is  a  hymn  of  peace.  Music  is  a  help 
to  memory,  bringing  the  dead  past  back  to  life  again, 
and  recalling  vividly  the  dear  old  scenes  and  old 
familiar  faces.  It  is  the  language  of  man's  highest 
thoughts  and  sublimest  imaginations.  It  cannot  be 
defined  like  other  arts,  because  its  conversation  and 
origin  are  not  of  earth  but  heaven.     The  language  of 


BEETHOVEN'S    FATHER  345 

music  is  more  eloquent  than  words,  althougli  its  mean- 
ing is  not  for  all,  but  for  those  only  who  are  responsive 
to  its  voice. 

This  voice,  like  that  internal  monitor  which  Socrates 
said  had  conversed  with  him  and  guided  him  even  from 
his  earliest  boyhood,  was  heard  by  Ludwig  von  Beet- 
hoven, before  he  knew  the  meaning  of  articulate  words. 
It  was  an  hereditary  gift  in  the  Beethoven  family. 
That  family  is  traceable  to  a  village  near  Lowen  in 
Belgium  in  the  seventeenth  century".  In  1650  a  mem- 
ber of  this  family,  a  lineal  ancestor  of  the  great  com- 
poser who  became  to  music  what  Shakspeare  was  to 
poetry,  settled  in  Antwerp.  Beethoven's  grandfather, 
Louis,  owing  to  a  quarrel  with  his  family,  left  Belgium 
for  Germany,  and  came  to  Bonn  in  1732,  where  his 
musical  talents  and  rich  basso  voice  did  not  long 
remain  unnoticed.  The  Archbishop  of  Cologne 
appointed  him  one  of  the  court  musicians,  and  the 
same  position  was  afterward  held  by  his  son,  Johann, 
the  great  Beethoven's  father.  The  latter  married 
Maria  Magdalena  Keverich,  daughter  of  a  cook  and 
widow  of  a  valet  de  chambre  of  the  Elector  of  Treves. 
The  day  of  their  son  Ludwig  s  birth  has  been  disputed, 
but  it  is  certain  that  he  was  baptized  on  the  17th  of 
December,  1770,  and  received  the  name  of  his  paternal 
grandfather,  Louis — in  German,  Ludwig.  Beethoven 
himself  seems  to  have  considered  the  16th  day  of 
December  in  the  above  year  as  his  birthday,  but  docu- 
mentary evidence  is  wanting.  At  one  period  of  his  life 
he  believed  himself  to  have  been  born  in  1772,  being 
most  likely  deceived  on  this  point  by  his  father,  who 
wished  his  neighbors   to    suppose   that  his  son  was 


346  THE   MOTHER   OF    BEETHOVEN. 

endowed  with  miraculous  precocity.  No  less  uncer- 
tain than  the  date  is  the  exact  place  of  Beethoven's 
birth.  Two  houses  in  Bonn  claim  the  honor.  It  was 
most  likely  No.  386  in  the  Bonngasse,  one  of  the  less 
important  streets  of  Bonn  which  runs  from  the  lower 
end  of  the  market-place  toward  the  Rhine. 

We  have  given  the  name  of  Beethoven' s  mother  as 
we  find  it  in  most  of  the  biographies,  but  it  is  proper 
to  state  that  others  give  her  Christian  name  as  Helena 
instead  of  Maria  Magdalena.  Johann  von  Beethoven 
married  her  in  1767,  when  she  was  the  widow  of  the 
Elector's  valet,  Nicholas  Laym.  It  appears  that  her 
first  child  by  Johann  von  Beethoven  was  born  in  Ai:»ril, 
1769,  and  died  within  a  week  of  his  birth.  He  was 
christened  Ludwig  Maria,  as  the  name  still  stands 
upon  the  baptismal  register  of  the  parish  of  St.  Remi- 
gius,  with  the  names  of  his  grandfather,  the  Kapell- 
meister Beethoven,  and  the  next-door  neighbor,  Frau 
Loher,  as  sponsors.  The  grandfather's  name  is  found 
in  the  same  register  as  godfather  to  the  second  cliild, 
also  christened  Ludwig,  coupled  with  the  name  of 
Frau  Gertrude  Miiller,  nee  Baum,  next-door  neighbor 
on  the  other  side,  as  godmother.  The  Beethovens  had 
no  kindred  in  Bonn  :  the  families  Ries  and  Salomon, 
their  intimate  friends,  were  Israelites ;  hence  the 
appearance  of  Frauen  Loher  and  Miiller  at  the  two 
baptismal  ceremonies. 

The  child  of  so  much  future  fame  had  but  just  com- 
pleted his  third  year  when  his  gi-andfather  and  god- 
father, the  Kapellmeister,  died.  His  most  affectionate 
and  grateful  recollections  in  after  life,  next  to  his 
patient  mother,  who  was  always  gentle  to  his  faults, 


A   DISSIPATED   FATHER.  347 

especial h'  his  obstinate  will,  were  of  the  kind  old 
grandfather  who  had  loved  and  petted  him.  The 
KaiDellmeister  was  long  remembered  in  Bonn  as  a 
short,  stout-built  man,  with  very  lovely  eyes,  who  used 
to  walk  vdth  great  dignity  to  and  from  his  dwelling  in 
the  Bonngasse,  clad  in  the  fashionable  red  cloak  of  the 
time.  Thus  too  he  was  depicted  by  the  court  painter, 
Radoux,  wearing  a  tasselled  cap  and  holding  a  roU  of 
music  in  his  hand.  His  wife,  the  Frau  Kapellmeisterin, 
nee  Josepha  Poll,  was  addicted  to  intemperance,  and 
in  her  last  years  was  placed  in  a  convent  in  Cologne. 

Beethoven's  father,  Johann,  inherited  his  mother  s 
propensity  for  strong  drink,  and  its  effect  was  soon 
visible  in  the  poverty  of  his  famil3\  He  left  the 
Bonngasse  for  quarters  in  that  house  in  the  Rhein- 
gasse  which  now  erroneously  bears  the  inscription, 
Liidwig  von  Beetlioven^  s  GeburtsJiaus. 

Johann  had  a  fine  tenor  voice  and  was  an  excellent 
musician,  but  his  salary  as  a  singer  was  small,  and  he 
soon  squandered  in  drink  the  small  inheritance  left 
him  by  tlie  old  Kapellmeister.  Even  the  portrait  of 
his  father  went  to  the  pawTibroker.  In  April,  1774, 
another  child,  Caspar  Anton  Carl,  was  born  to  the 
Beethovens,  and  their  expenses  were  increased.  To 
this  event  Dr.  Wegeler  attributes  the  unrelenting  per- 
severance of  the  father  in  keeping  little  Ludwdg  from 
this  time  to  his  daily  lessons  upon  the  piano-forte. 
Both  "Wegeler  and  Burgomaster  Windeck,  of  Bonn, 
sixty  years  afterward,  remembered  how  as  boys,  visit- 
ing a  playmate  in  another  house  across  the  small  court, 
they  often  "saw  little  Louis,  his  labors  and  sorrows." 
Cecilia  Fischer,  too,  a  playmate  of  Beethoven  in  hi^ 


348  THE  MOTHER   OF   BEETHOVEN. 

early  childhood,  and  living  in  the  same  house  in  her 
old  age,  ' '  still  saw  the  little  boy  standing  upon  a  low 
footstool  and  practising  his  fathers  lessons,  in  tears." 

The  father  perhaps  recognized  the  cliild's  genius  and 
hoped  that  at  an  early  age  he  Avould  retrieve  the  fort- 
unes of  the  family.  The  recent  success  of  Leopold 
Mozart  with  the  little  Wolfgang  was  no  doubt  well 
known  to  him,  and  his  neighbor  Hies  had  made  his 
bov  Franz  remunerative  as  a  musician.  At  all  events, 
we  have  Beethoven's  word  for  it  that  "  already  in  his 
fourth  year  music  became  his  principal  employment." 

A  pathetic  letter  written  by  Ludwig  on  October  6th, 
1802,  when  he  was  nearly  thirty-two  years  old,  and 
addressed  to  his  brothers  Carl  and  Johann  Beethoven, 
gives  us  a  touching  insight  into  his  sufiferings  in  child- 
hood and  youth  : 

"  Oh,  ye  who  think  or  declare  me  to  be  hostile, 
morose,  and  misanthroj^ical,  how  unjust  you  are, 
and  how  little  you  know  the  secret  cause  of  what 
appears  thus  to  you  !  My  heart  and  mind  w^ere  ever 
from  childhood  prone  to  the  most  tender  feelings  of 
affection,  and  I  was  always  disposed  to  accomplish 
something  great.  But  you  must  remember  that  six 
years  ago  I  was  attacked  by  an  incurable  malady, 
aggravated  by  unskilful  physicians,  deluded  from  year 
to  year,  too,  by  the  hope  of  relief,  and  at  length  forced 
to  the  conviction  of  a  lasting  affliction,  the  cure  of 
which  may  go  on  for  years,  and  perhaps  after  all  prove 
incurable. 

"  Born  with  a  passionate  and  excitable  temperament, 
keenly  susceptible  to  the  pleasures  of  society,  X  was 


A   SAD   FATE.  349 

yet  obliged  early  in  life  to  isolate  myself,  and  to  pass 
my  existence  in  solitude.  If  I  at  any  time  resolved  to 
surmount  all  this,  oh  !  how  cruelly  was  I  again  repelled 
by  the  experience,  sadder  than  ever,  of  my  defective 
hearing !  and  yet  I  found  it  impossible  to  say  to 
others,  '  Speak  louder  ;  shout !  for  I  am  deaf  ! '  Alas  ! 
how  could  I  proclaim  the  deficiency  of  a  sense  which 
ought  to  have  been  more  perfect  with  me  than  with 
other  men,  a  sense  which  I  once  i)ossessed  in  the  high- 
est jjerfection,  to  an  extent,  indeed,  that  few  of  my 
profession  ever  enjoyed.  Alas,  I  cannot  do  this ! 
Forgive  me,  therefore,  when  you  see  me  withdraw 
from  you  with  whom  I  would  so  gladly  mingle.  My 
misfortune  is  doubly  severe  from  causing  me  to  be  mis- 
understood. No  longer  can  I  enjoy  recreation  in  social 
intercourse,  refined  conversation,  or  mutual  outpour- 
ings of  thought.  Completely  isolated,  I  only  enter 
society  when  compelled  to  do  so.  I  must  live  like  an 
exile.  In  company  I  am  assailed  by  the  most  painful 
apprehensions,  from  the  dread  of  being  exposed  to  the 
risk  of  my  condition  being  observed.  It  was  the  same 
during  the  last  six  months  I  spent  in  the  country. 
My  intelligent  j)hysician  recommended  me  to  spare  my 
hearing  as  much  as  possible,  which  was  quite  in  accord- 
ance with  my  present  disposition,  though  sometimes, 
tempted  by  my  natural  inclinations  for  society,  I 
allowed  myself  to  be  beguiled  into  it.  But  what 
humiliation  when  any  one  beside  me  heard  a  flute  in 
the  far  distance,  while  I  heard  nothing,  or  when  others 
heard  a  shepherd  singing,  and  I  still  heard  nothing  ! 
Such  things  brought  me  to  the  verge  of  desperation, 
and  well-nigh   caused  me  to   put   an  end  to  my  life. 


350  THE   MOTHER   OF   BEETHOVEN. 

Art,  art  alone,  deterred  me.  Ah  !  how  could  I  possi- 
bly quit  the  world  before  bringing  forth  all  that  I  felt 
it  was  my  vocation  to  produce  %  And  thus  I  spared 
this  miserable  life — so  utterly  miserable  that  any  sud- 
den change  may  reduce  me  at  any  moment  from  my 
best  condition  into  the  worst.  It  is  decreed  that  I 
must  now  choose  patience  for  my  guide  !  This  I  have 
done.  I  hope  the  resolution  will  not  fail  me  stead- 
fastly to  persevere  till  it  may  please  the  miserable 
Fates  to  cut  the  thread  of  my  life.  Perhaps  I  may  get 
better,  perhaps  not.  I  am  prepared  for  either.  Con- 
strained to  become  a  philosopher  in  my  twenty-eighth 
year  !  [Beethoven,  as  has  been  previously  stated,  did 
not  know  his  own  age.]  This  is  no  slight  trial,  and 
more  severe  on  an  artist  than  on  any  one  else.  Grod 
looks  into  my  heart,  He  searches  it,  and  knows  that 
love  for  man  and  feelings  of  benevolence  have  their 
abode  there  !  Oh,  ye  who  may  one  day  read  this, 
think  that  you  have  done  me  injustice,  and  let  any  one 
similarly  afflicted  be  consoled  by  finding  one  like 
himself,  who,  in  defiance  of  all  the  obstacles  of  nature, 
lias  done  all  in  his  power  to  be  included  in  the  ranks 
of  estimable  artists  and  men.  My  brothers  Carl  and 
Johann,  as  soon  as  I  am  no  more,  if  Professor  Schmidt 
be  still  alive,  beg  him  in  my  name  to  describe  my 
malad}',  and  to  add  these  pages  to  the  analysis  of  my 
disease,  that  at  least,  so  far  as  possible,  the  world  may 
be  reconciled  to  me  after  my  death.  I  also  hereby 
declare  you  both  heirs  to  my  small  fortune,  if  so  it 
may  be  called.  Share  it  fairly,  agree  together,  and 
assist  each  other.  You  know  that  anything  you  did 
to  give  me  pain  has  long  been  forgiven.     I  thank  you. 


THOUGHTS  OF   DEATH.  351 

my  brother  Carl  in  j)articiilar,  for  the  attendance  you 
have  shown  me  of  late.  My  wish  is  that  you  may 
enjoy  a  hai^pier  life  and  one  more  free  from  care  than 
mine  has  been.  Recommend  virtue  to  your  children  ; 
that  alone,  and  not  wealth,  can  insure  happiness.  I 
speak  from  experience.  It  was  Virtue  alone  that  sus- 
tained me  in  my  misery  ;  I  have  to  thank  her  and  art 
for  not  having  ended  my  life  by  suicide.  Farewell  I 
Love  each  other.  I  gratefully  thank  all  my  friends. 
.  .  .  How  much  I  shall  rejoice  if  I  can  serve  you  even 
in  the  grave  !  So  be  it  then  I  I  joyfully  hasten  to 
meet  Death.  If  he  comes  before  I  have  had  the  oppor- 
tunity of  developing  all  my  artistic  powers,  then,  not- 
withstanding my  cruel  fate,  he  will  come  too  early  for 
me,  and  I  should  wish  for  him  at  a  more  distant 
period  ;  but  even  then  I  shall  be  content,  for  his  advent 
will  release  me  from  a  state  of  endless  suffering.  Come 
when  he  may,  I  shall  meet  him  with  courage.  Fare- 
well I  Do  not  quite  forget  me,  even  in  death.  I 
deserve  this  from  you,  because  during  my  life  I  so 
often  thought  of  you,  and  wished  to  make  you  happy. 
Amen.  Ludwig  vois^  Beethoven." 

This  letter  was  addressed  from  Heiligenstadt, 
whither  he  had  gone  to  receive  new  treatment  for  his 
deafness.     On  the  outside  of  it  he  adds  : 

'*'  Thus,  then,  I  take  leave  of  you,  and  with  sadness 
too.  The  fond  hope  I  brought  -wdth  me  here,  of  being 
to  a  certain  degree  cured,  now  utterly  forsakes  me. 
As  autumn  leaves  fall  and  wither,  so  are  my  hopes 
blighted.  Almost  as  I  came,  I  dejiart.  Even  the  lofty 
courage  that  so  often  animated  me  in  the  lovely  days 


352  THE  MOTHER  OF  BEETHOVEN. 

of  summer  is  gone  forever.  O  Providence  !  vouchsafe 
me  one  day  of  pure  felicity  !  How  long  have  I  been 
estranged  from  the  glad  echo  of  true  Joy  !  AVhen, 
O  my  Grod,  when  shall  I  again  feel  it  in  the  temple 
of  nature  and  of  man  ? — never  !  Ah  !  that  would  be 
too  hard  ! 

"To  be  read  and  fulfilled  after  my  death  by  my 
brothers  Carl  and  Johann." 

But  his  end  was  not  to  be  by  and  by  ;  he  had  yet 
many  years  to  live.  He  still  wrote  letters  twenty-five 
years  after  this  letter  was  penned,  and  when  the 
brothers  to  whom  it  was  addressed  had  preceded  him 
to  the  tomb.  His  nephew  Carl  became  his  ward  in 
1815,  on  the  death  of  his  father,  and  he  always 
addressed  him  as  his  son  and  styled  himself  his  father. 
He  tells  him  in  one  letter  that  he  is  a  thriftless  boy 
and  spends  too  much  money,  whereas  he  had  him- 
self rejoiced  when  young  "  to  assist,  when  I  could, 
my  poor  i^arents."  "  What  a  contrast,"  he  adds 
good-hum oredly,  "are  you  in  your  conduct  toward 
me !" 

Beethoven's  mother,  whose  name  must  certainly 
have  been  Maria  Magdalena  and  not  Helena,  as  given 
by  some  writers,  died  on  the  ITtli  of  July,  1787,  when 
her  son  Ludwig  was  only  sixteen  and  a  half  years  old. 
This  accounts  for  the  fact  that,  although  he  spoke  of 
her  often  in  conversations  with  his  friends  about  his 
childhood,  he  only  alludes  to  her  twice  in  all  his  cor- 
respondence. In  one  of  his  last  letters  addressed  to 
his  old  friend  Dr.  Wegeler,  and  dated  Vienna,  October 
7th,  1826,  he  says  :  "  You  write  that  in  some  book  I 
am  declared  to  be  the  natural  son  of  the  King  of  Prus- 


A   MOTHER'S   ADVOCATE.  353 

sia.  This  was  mentioned  to  me  long  ago  ;  but  I  have 
made  it  a  rule  never  either  to  write  anything  about 
myself,  or  to  answer  anything  written  by  others  about 
me.  I  therefore  gladly  devolve  on  you  the  duty  of 
making  known  to  the  world  the  respectability  of  my 
parents,  and  especially  that  of  my  motlierP  But  the 
most  touching  reference  to  her  is  in  a  letter  which  he 
wrote  on  the  15th  of  September,  1787,  to  a  Dr.  Schade, 
an  advocate  of  Augsburg.  Although  not  yet  seventeen, 
he  had  already  attained  the  position  of  Court  Organist 
of  Cologne,  an  office  apparently  of  more  dignity  than 
remAineration. 

"  My  most  esteemed  Friend  :  I  can  easily  imagine 
what  you  must  think  of  me,  and  I  cannot  deny  that 
you  have  too  good  grounds  for  an  unfavorable  opinion. 
I  shall  not,  however,  attempt  to  justify  myself,  until  I 
have  explained  to  you  the  reasons  why  my  apologies 
should  be  accepted.  I  must  tell  you  that  from  the 
time  I  left  Augsburg  my  cheerfulness,  as  well  as  my 
health,  began  to  decline  ;  the  nearer  I  came  to  my 
native  city,  the  more  frequent  were  the  letters  from  my 
father,  urging  me  to  travel  with  all  possible  speed,  as 
my  mother' s  health  was  in  a  most  precarious  condition. 
I  therefore  hurried  forward  as  fast  as  I  could,  although 
myself  far  from  well.  My  longing  once  more  to  see 
my  dying  mother  overcame  every  obstacle,  and  assisted 
me  in  surmounting  the  greatest  difficulties.  I  found 
my  mother  indeed  still  alive,  but  in  the  most  deplorable 
state  ;  her  disease  was  consumption,  and  about  seven 
weeks  ago,  after  much  pain  and  suffering,  she  died. 
She  was  indeed  a  kind,  loving  mother  to  me,  and  my 


354  THE  MOTHER   OF   BEETHOVEN. 

best  friend.  Ah  I  who  was  happier  than  I  when  1 
could  still  utter  the  name  of  mother,  and  it  was  heard  ? 
But  to  whom  can  I  now  say  it  ?  Only  to  the  silent 
form  resembling  her,  evoked  by  the  power  of  imagina- 
tion. I  have  passed  very  few  pleasant  hours  since  my 
arrival  here,  having  during  the  whole  time  been  suffer- 
ing from  asthma,  which  may,  I  fear,  eventually  turn 
to  consumption  ;  to  this  is  added  melancholy,  almost 
as  great  an  evil  as  my  malady  itself.  Imagine  yourself 
in  my  place,  and  then  I  shall  hope  to  receive  your  for- 
giveness for  my  long  silence.  You  showed  me  extreme 
kindness  and  friendship)  by  lending  me  three  carolins 
in  Augsburg,  but  I  must  entreat  your  indulgence  for  a 
time.  My  journey  cost  me  a  great  deal,  and  I  have 
not  the  smallest  hojDes  of  earning  anything  here.  Fate 
is  not  propitious  to  me  in  Bonn.  Pardon  my  intrud- 
ing on  you  so  long  with  my  affairs,  but  all  that  I  have 
said  was  necessary  for  my  own  justification.  I  do 
entreat  you  not  to  deprive  me  of  your  valuable  friend- 
ship ;  nothing  do  I  wish  so  much  as  in  any  degree  to 
become  worthy  of  your  regard. 

"lam,  with  all  esteem,  your  obedient  servant  and 
friend,  L.  v.  Beethoven." 

We  know  from  other  sources  the  extreme  poverty  in 
which  the  Beethoven  family  was  at  this  period  sunk. 
In  its  extremitj^  at  the  time  when  the  mother  died, 
Franz  Ries,  the  violinist,  came  to  its  assistance,  and 
his  kindness  was  never  forgotten  by  Ludwig  von  Beet- 
hoven. When  Ferdinand,  the  son  of  this  Ries,  reached 
Vienna  in  the  autumn  of  ISOO,  Beethoven  said,  "  I  can- 
not answer  your  father  yet ;  but  write  and  tell  him 


A   GREAT  MUSICIAN.  355 

that  I  have  not  forgotten  the  death  of  my  mother. 
That  will  fully  satisfy  him/' 

At  the  time  of  his  good  mothers  death,  young  Beet- 
hoven had  his  hands  full,  and  had  little  time  to  think 
about  his  own  physical  ailments  and  mental  depres- 
sion. His  father  barely  supported  himself  and  spent  in 
drink  what  might  have  helped  his  children.  The  sup- 
port of  his  two  younger  brothers,  therefore,  devolved 
upon  Ludwig,  and  he  proved  equal  to  his  untimely 
responsibilities.  He  played  his  organ — the  instrument 
which  was  then  above  all  others  to  his  taste  ;  entered 
the  Court  Orchestra  as  player  on  the  violin  and  cham- 
ber pianist  as  well  as  organist.  Beside  this  he 
increased  his  scanty  means  by  teaching,  although  it 
was  an  occupation  which  his  nervous  irritability  ren- 
dered distasteful  to  him.  It  proves  no  small  energy 
of  character,  that  the  motherless  boy  of  seventeen, 
"  afflicted  with  asthma,"  which  he  feared  might  "  end 
in  consumption,"  and  struggling  against  a  melancholy 
which  was  almost  as  great  a  misfortune  as  sickness 
itself,  succeeded  in  overcoming  all  obstacles  and  earned 
a  subsistence  for  his  father  and  brothers  as  well  as  for 
himself.  When  he  left  Bonn,  finally,  five  years  later, 
Carl,  then  eighteen,  could  support  himself  by  teaching 
music,  and  Johann,  the  youngest  of  the  brothers,  was 
apprenticed  to  the  court  apothecary  ;  while  the  father, 
although  no  longer  an  active  member  of  the  Electoral 
Chapel,  appears  to  have  had  a  small  pension  which 
sufficed  for  the  few  remaining  weeks  which  his  habit 
of  drinldng  allotted  him  of  life. 

As  we  have  said,    Beethoven's  musical  education, 
which  was  begun  by  his  father,  was  in  progress  when 


35G  THE  MOTHER  OF  BEETHOVEN 

he  was  only  a  little  child  four  years  of  age.  At  eleven 
he  was  a  musical  author,  dedicating  his  sonatas  to  the 
Elector  of  Cologne.  Between  these  years  his  other 
studies  had  not  been  neglected,  and  he  was  conversant 
with  French — then  a  necessary  accomplishment  in  all 
the  Rhine  provinces,  as  indeed  it  is  to-day — and  knew 
some  Latin  and  mathematics,  and  possibly  a  little  Eng- 
lish. But  music  was  the  vital  element  of  all  his  train- 
ing, and  in  addition  to  his  father's  teaching  he  engaged 
the  tuition  of  Pfeiffer,  chorist  or  precentor  in  the  Elec- 
toral Orchestra,  Van  der  Eder,  the  court  organist,  and 
then  of  Christian  Gottlieb  Neefe.  The  appointment  of 
that  musician  as  organist  to  the  Electoral  Court  bears 
the  date  of  February  15th,  1781,  when  Ludwig  had  but 
just  completed  the  tenth  year  of  his  age,  and  the  sixth 
of  his  musical  education. 

The  first  public  notice  of  the  wonderful  boy  musician 
was  written  in  1782,  when  he  had  been  a  pupil  of  Neefe 
for  a  little  over  a  year,  and  occurs  in  an  account  of  the 
virtuosos  in  the  service  of  the  Elector  at  Bonn.  The 
writer,  who  may  have  been  Neefe  himself,  closes  his  list 
of  musicians  and  singers  thus  : 

"  Louis  von  Beethoven,  son  of  the  above-named  ten- 
orist,  a  boy  of  eleven  years  and  of  most  promising 
talents.  He  plays  the  piano-forte  with  great  skill  and 
power,  reads  exceedingly  well  at  sight,  and  to  say  all 

» 

in  a  word,  plays  nearly  the  whole  of  Sebastian  Bach's 
'  Wohltemi:)erirtes  Klavier,'  placed  in  his  hands  by 
Herr  Neefe.  Whoever  is  acquainted  with  this  collec- 
tion of  preludes  and  fugues  in  every  key  (which  one 
almost  calls  the  ne  plus  ultra  of  music)  knows  well 
what  this  implies.     Herr  Neefe  has  also,  so  far  as  his 


MOZART   AND   BEETHOVEN.  "  357 

other  duties  allowed,  given  him  some  instruction  in 
thorough-bass.  At  present  he  is  exercising  him  in 
composition,  and  for  his  encouragement  has  caused  nine 
variations  composed  by  him  for  the  piano-forte  upon  a 
march  (by  Dressier)  to  be  engraved  at  Mannheim,  This 
young  genius  certainly  deserves  such  assistance  as  will 
enable  him  to  travel.  He  will  assuredly  become  a 
second  AYolfgang  Amadeus  Mozart,  should  he  continue 
as  he  has  begun." 

In  the  autumn  of  1786,  Herr  Neefe's  wish  that  his 
pupil  should  travel  was  accomplished,  and  he  obtained, 
through  the  Austrian  Count  Waldstein,  the  bosom 
friend  of  the  new  Elector  Max  Franz,  the  means  of  his 
studying  at  Vienna,  then  the  musical  capital  of  the 
world.  There  he  was  placed  under  the  tuition  of  Mo- 
zart, then  the  master  of  all  living  masters.  Leyfried 
and  Holmes  relate  the  surprise  of  Mozart  at  hearing  the 
boy,  now  sixteen  years  of  age,  treat  an  intricate  fugue 
theme  which  he  gave  him,  and  his  prophecy  that 
"  that  young  man  would  some  day  make  himself  heard 
of  in  the  world." 

It  was  during  the  sixteen  years  of  boyhood  that  pre- 
ceded this  first  visit  to  Vienna  that  Beethoven  was 
cherished  by  a  mother's  love.  His  father,  in  addition 
to  his  intemperance,  was  of  a  harsh,  exacting  temper, 
and  was  a  hard  taskmaster  to  his  son.  Every  record 
we  have  of  Ludwig  von  Beethoven  shows  not  only  his 
own  affectionate  and  sincere  disposition,  but  his 
extreme  sensitiveness  to  the  kindness  or  unkindness  of 
others  toward  him.  He  must  have  suffered  exquisite 
torture  at  beholding  the  brutal  conduct  of  his  father  ; 
and  his  reminiscences  of  his  mother,  though  summed 


358  THE   MOTHER   OF   BEETHOVEN. 

"up  in  a  few  brief  sentences,  prove  beyond  a  doubt  that 
it  was  to  lier  sympathetic  ear  that  he  confided  his  sor- 
row's and  aspirations,  and  that  it  was  nj)on  her  bosom 
that  lie  hid  his  tears.  He  could  look  to  his  father 
neither  for  counsel  nor  example,  although  it  was  from 
his  father  that  he  learned  the  rudiments  of  his  divine 
art.  It  may  be  said  that  the  peasant  maiden  of  Co- 
blentz,  a  city  which  Beethoven  afterward  visited  on  a 
delightful  journey  along  the  windings  of  the  Rhine 
and  Main,  who  had  married  first  a  cook  or  valet  of  the 
Elector  of  Cologne  and  then  a  man  of  such  habits  as 
Beethoven's  father,  could  scarcely  have  been  refined 
enough  in  feeling  to  sympathize  with  so  great  a  son. 
But  a  mother's  instincts  are  not  dependent  on  cult- 
ure and  good  society,  although  the  Beethovens  un- 
doubtedly mingled  with  the  best  citizens  of  Bonn.  If 
she  could  not  impart  knowledge  to  him,  she  could 
encourage  him  to  persevere  in  acquiring  it.  She  could 
soothe  and  calm  his  grief  under  the  severe  treatment  he 
received  from  his  father.  She  could  lull  his  over- 
wrought feelings  into  tranquillity  and  rest.  No  mother 
can  need  a  higher  tribute  than  that  he  ^^aid  to  her 
memory.  "  She  was  to  me  such  a  good  and  loving 
mother,  the  best  of  friends.  Oh,  who  would  be  so 
happy  as  I,  could  I  still  sj^eak  the  sweet  name 
'  mother,'  and  have  her  hear  it  T' 

Perhaps  she  did  hear  it  as  it  came  w^afted  like  a 
sweet  incense  of  prayer  and  benediction  to  her  heavenly 
home.  Perhaps  during  the  forty  years  that  he  out- 
lived her,  her  spiritual  presence  may  have  cheered  his 
heart  and  helped  him  to  suffer  patiently  his  great 
affliction.     Hers  was  the  only  woman's  love  and  sym- 


HOLY   MEMORIES.  359 

pathy  lie  ever  knew  in  liis  fifty-six  years  of  painful 
and  distressing  life.  Who  knows  but  that  in  those 
moments  of  deepest  melancholy  and  heaviest  gloom, 
Avhen,  but  for  virtue  and  his  much-loved  art,  as  he  tells 
us,  he  would  have  committed  suicide,  her  spirit  may 
have  hovered  near  him  as  a  guardian  angel  to  sustain 
his  courage  and  shed  light  and  patience  on  his  heart. 
The  very  virtue  of  which  he  speaks,  the  faith  in  God, 
the  good-will  to  man,  he  must  have  learned  of  her. 
At  her  knee  he  had  said  his  prayers  in  childhood,  and 
wT^th  her  kiss  and  blessing  had  lain  down  to  sleep  I 
Such  memories  may  have  been  sweeter  than  his  own 
music  to  the  lonely  man.  And  when,  after  many 
hours  of  unconsciousness  and  a  terrible  death-struggle, 
the  great  maestro  passed  from  a  world  of  discord  to 
one  of  everlasting  harmony  amid  a  violent  spring  storm 
of  thunder  and  lightning,  on  the  evening  of  March 
26th,  1827,  his  mother's  voice  may  have  sounded  to  his 
now  quickened  hearing,  bidding  his  suffering  spirit 
welcome  to  "  the  choir  invisible, "  that  sings  praise  for- 
ever in  the  presence  of  God. 


THE  MOTHER   OF   SHERIDAN. 

Frances  Sheridan,  the  mother  of  Richard  Brinsley 
Sheridan,  was  born  in  Ireland  in  1724  and  died  at  Blois 
in  France,  in  1766,  before  she  had  completed  her  forty- 
seventh  year.  She  was  the  daughter  of  Dr.  Philip 
Chamberlayne,  and  attracted  the  attention  of  her  future 
husband,  Thomas  Sheridan,  by  a  pamphlet  which  she 
wrote  in  his  favor  during  a  somewhat  angry  controversy 
which  was  then  going  on  relative  to  the  theatre  in  Dub- 
lin, in  which  he  was  largely  interested.  Previous  to 
this,  however,  when  she  was  only  fifteen  years  of  age, 
she  composed  a  romance  in  two  volumes,  entitled 
"  Eugenia  and  Adelaide."  It  was  long  afterward 
adapted  for  the  stage,  as  a  comic  drama,  by  Mrs. 
Lefanu,  Mrs.  Sheridan's  eldest  daughter,  and  was 
subsequently  produced  with  considerable  success  at 
the  Dul)lin  Theatre, 

Mrs.  Sheridan  also  wrote  a  novel  of  a  sentimental 
and  pathetic  kind,  in  the  style  of  that  "  English 
novel"  of  which  Richardson  is  reputed  by  most 
literary  critics  to  have  been  the  founder,  entitled 
"  Memoirs  of  Miss  Sidney  Biddulph,  extracted  from 
her  own  Journals  and  now  first  published"  (London, 
17G1),  which  was  translated  into  French  as  "  Memoires 
d'une  Jeune  Dame,"  by  the  Abbe  Prevost.  This  novel 
was  very  successful  both  in  English  and  French,  and 
part   of  it  was    dramatized.     The  London  Monthhj 


A   PHOLIFIC   AUTHOR.  361 

Jteview  of  Axnil,  1761,  pronounced  it  "  greatly  superior 
to  most  of  the  productions  of  her  brother  novelists." 
In  Crocker's  Bos  well's  Johnson  it  is  called  "  a  novel 
of  great  merit,"  and  we  there  read  that  Dr.  Johnson 
paid  her  this  high  compliment  upon  it :  "I  know  now, 
madam,  that  you  have  a  right,  upon  moral  principles, 
to  make  your  readers  suffer  so  much."  Lord  North 
commended  the  work  highlj^  and  Charles  James  Fox 
•'  thought  Sidney  Biddulph  the  best  novel  of  our  age." 
Her  famous  son,  according  to  Samuel  Rogers's  "  Recol- 
lections," "in  the  heat  of  argument  denied  having 
read  it,  though  the  plot  of  his  School  for  Scandal  was 
borrowed  from  it."  Rogers,  w^ho  was  an  excellent 
judge  of  the  literary  performances  of  others,  declared 
that  "  the  second  part  is  very  excellent." 

Mrs.  Sheridan  was  also  the  author  of  Tlie  Dis- 
covery, a  comedy,  published  in  1763,  which  was  suc- 
cessful. Garrick  not  only  played  the  j)rincipal  part  in 
it,  but  considered  it  one  of  the  best  plays  he  had  ever 
read.  TJie  Dupe,  a  comedy  i)ublished  in  the  following 
year,  was  also  by  her.  Then  followed  "  The  History 
of  Nourjahad,"  which  Mrs.  Sheridan  intended  to  be 
the  jS.rst  of  a  series  of  moral  fictions.  It  is  a  romance, 
and  was  dramatized  after  her  death,  'Dr.  Johnson  said 
of  it,  "  Her  last  work  is  perhaps  her  best,  '  Nourjahad,' 
an  Eastern  tale,  in  which  a  pure  morality  is  inculcated 
with  a  great  deal  of  fancy  and  considerable  force." 
Mrs.  Sheridan  also  wrote  a  play  called  TJie  Trip  to 
Bath.  It  was  never  acted  nor  published,  but  is  said  to 
have  formed  the  basis  of  her  son's  comedy.  The  Rivals. 

Mrs.  Frances  Sheridan  did  not  confine  herself  to 
novels  and  plays.    She  wrote  some  fugitive  verses  which 


362  THE  MOTHER  OF  SHERIDAN. 

are  found  in  Dyce's  "  Specimens  of  British  Poetesses."" 
Leigh  Hunt,  in  his  "  Men,  Women,  and  Books,''  says, 
' '  The  verses  of  Mrs.  Sheridan,  mother  of  the  famous 
Sheridan  and  author  of  '  Sidney  Biddulph,"  are  not 
so  good  as  her  novels."  ''I  once,''  said  Dr.  Parr, 
"met  his  [R.  B.  Sheridan's]  mother.  She  was  quite 
celestial !  Both  her  virtues  and  her  genius  were  highly 
esteemed."  And  Dr.  Johnson  once  said,  "  I  wish  him 
[Thomas  Sheridan  ]  well,  and  among  other  reasons, 
because  I  like  his  wife."  He  and  Thomas  Sheridan 
received  a  pension  of  two  hundred  pounds  a  year  from 
the  Crown  nearly  at  the  same  time,  and  the  ill-natured 
remark  of  Dr.  Johnson  was,  on  learning  the  fact, 
"  What !  have  they  given  him  a  pension  ?  Then  it  is 
time  for  me  to  give  up  mine."  It  was  a  mean  speech, 
and  Thomas  Sheridan  resented  it  and  cut  the  lexicog- 
rapher's acquaintance  in  future,  but  no  doubt  it  was 
said  in  one  of  those  savage  moods  to  which  Dr.  Johnson 
was  so  liable. 

It  is  to  be  regretted  that  Moore,  in  his  "  Life  of  Rich- 
ard Brinsley  Sheridan,"  did  not  take  the  pains  to  give 
his  readers  some  information  concerning  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  families  as  regards  hereditary  genius  that 
ever  existed.  All  we  read  in  the  preface  is  that  "  the 
details  of  Mr.  Sheridan's  early  life  were  obligingly  com- 
municated to  me  by  his  youngest  sister,  Mrs.  Lefanu, 
to  whom  and  to  her  highly  gifted  daughter  I  offer 
my  best  thanks  for  the  assistance  which  they  have 
afforded  me."  One  would  think  that  Moore  would 
have  deemed  such  ' '  highly  gifted  ' '  women  worthy  ot 
some  notice  in  the  body  of  the  work,  but  the  only 
notice  we  find  even  of  Sheridan's  mother  is  that  "  she 


THE   FAMILY   HISTORY.  363 

was  a  woman  of  considerable  talents,  and  affords  one 
of  the  few  instances  that  have  occurred  of  a  female 
indebted  for  a  husband  to  her  literature."     Moore  also 

« 

records  the  praise  which  Lord  Xorth,  Fox,  and  Garrick 
bestowed  upon  her  works,  which  we  have  already 
quoted. 

But  in  point  of  fact  the  Sheridans  have  been  as  rare 
a  family  as  can  be  found  in  the  literary  biography  of 
any  country.  For  thi^ee  hundred  years,  and  for  eight 
generations  in  direct  descent,  they  have  been  distin- 
guished in  authorship.  In  the  year  1600,  Donald 
O'  Sheridan  was  living  in  a  castle  in  the  small  island 
of  Loughoughter  in  the  County  of  Cavan,  where  his 
ancestors  had  been  connected  with  a  school  of  learning. 
This  Donald  was  married  to  a  daughter  of  one  of  the 
northern  O'Xeills,  and  their  daughter  Sarah  Sheridan 
became  grandmother  of  the  celebrated  "  Brigade" 
Sarsfield,  Earl  of  Lucan.  Their  two  sons,  Coconochet 
and  Denis,  both  men  of  education,  were  converted  to 
Protestantism  by  Bishop  Bedell,  and  he  and  Denis 
Sheridan  corresponded  in  Latin,  and  their  letters  may 
still  be  read  in  the  British  Museum.  Denis  was  the 
first  real  author  of  the  family.  He  translated  the  Bible 
into  the  Irish  tongue,  with  the  assistance  of  this 
famous  bishop,  who  lived  in  his  latter  days  and  died  at 
the  Sheridan  homestead  of  Quilca,  near  Loughoughter. 
Denis  Sheridan's  Irish  Bible  was  subsequently  i^rinted 
and  published  by  the  Honorable  Eobert  Boyle. 

The  converted  Sheridans  received  a  good  deal  of 
patronage.  Denis,  the  Biblical  translator,  married  an 
Englishwoman,  and  their  son  AVilliam  Sheridan  be- 
came chaplain  to  the  famous  Viceroy  Butler,    Duke 


3G4  THE   MOTHER   OF   SHERIDAN. 

of  Oraiond,  and  was  made  Lord  Bishop   of  Kilmore. 
Bishop  William  Sheridan  was  strongly  attached  to  the 
house  of  Stnart,  and  rather  than  take  the  oath  of  alle- 
giance to  William  of  Orange,  he  was  tnrned  out  of  his 
see  like  the  other  No n- jurors.     He  was  intimate  ^vith 
Dean  Swift,  and  died  in  1715.     Another  son  of  Biblical 
Denis  was  Patrick,  Lord  Bishop  of  Dromore,  who  died 
in  1682.     A  third  son  of  Denis  was  Thomas  Sheridan, 
who  was  educated  for  the  law  at  the  Temple  in  London, 
and  was  afterward  made  collector  of  duties  at  the  Cus- 
tom-House  of  Cork.     James  the  Second  made  liim  a 
Privy  Councillor  and  knighted  him  in  1685.     Bishop 
Burnet  called  him  a  very  ' '  bold,  forward  Irishman. ' '    A 
son  of  this  Sir  Thomas  Sheridan  was  the  better  known 
Sir  Thomas   Sheridan    who    became  tutor  to   Prince 
Charles  Edward  Stuart,  and  accompanied  his  pupil  in 
the  rebellion  in  Scotland  in  1745.     The  fourth  son  of 
Denis  was  James,  who  remained  at  home  to  inherit  his 
father's  property  and  the  homestead  of  Quilca,    and 
l)ecame  in  due  time  the  father  of  Dr.  Thomas  Sheridan, 
the  intimate  friend  and  boon  comi)anion  of  Dean  Swift, 
who  spent  much  of  his  time  at  Quilca  and  quizzed  its 
owner  for  not  keeping  it  in  better  order.     In  spite  of 
the  great  satirist's  epigrammatic  attacks  ui)on  this  farm- 
house, which  had  all  its  rambling  rooms  on  the  ground 
floor,  and  had  no  ceiling  overhead  but  the  rafters,  Swift's 
happiest  days  were  spent  there.     Dr.  Thomas  Sheridan 
died  in  1738,  seven  years  before  Dean  Swift,  and  left 
seven  children,  the  youngest  of  whom,    Hester,  was 
subsequently  the  mother  of  James  Sheridan  Knowles, 
teacher,  elocutionist,  and   in  his  last   days  preacher, 
who  was  therefore  first  cousin  to  R.  B.  Sheridan. 


MARRIAGE   OF   SHERIDAN.  365 

Thomas  Sheridan,  son  of  the  above  Dr.  Sheridan, 
Swift's  friend,  was  born  in  1719,  and  after  graduating 
at  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  drifted  to  the  drama  and 
the  stage.  At  the  ag^  of  twenty-four  he  ai)peared  on 
the  boards  as  Richard  the  Third,  Hamlet,  Othello, 
Brutus,  and  Cato..  In  1747  he  married  Miss  Frances 
Chamberlavne,  the  mother  of  Richard  Brinslev  Sheri- 
dan,  under  the  romantic  circumstances  we  have 
described.  He  went  to  England  wdth  his  wife  and 
little  son,  and  there  lectured  on  elocution  and  dramatic 
art,  adapted  old  plays  for  the  stage,  and  brought  out 
the  life  and  works  of  Dr.  Jonathan  SAvift,  in  nineteen 
volumes.  In  1775  he  was  lucky  enough  to  get  a  pen- 
sion of  two  hundred  j)ounds  a  year  from  the  British 
Government,  and  in  1782  he  saw  his  son  Richard 
Brinsley  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  and  his  son 
Charles  Francis  Secretary  of  War  in  Ireland.  Thomas 
Sheridan  wrote  also  a  Pronouncing  Dictionary  of  the 
English  Language,  which  held  its  ground  as  an  author- 
ity for  half  a  century. 

His  daughter,  Mrs.  Lefanu,  of  Dublin,  possessed 
much  of  the  family  talent.  She  wrote  fables  and 
stories  which  were  much  admired  at  the  time.  Her 
daughter.  Miss  Alicia  Lefanu,  wTote  a  Memoir  of  her 
grandmother,  Frances  Sheridan,  the  subject  of  this 
sketch  and  "  Sheridan's  mother." 

Beside  James  Sheridan  Knowles,  his  first  cousin,  who 
died  in  1862,  in  the  seventy-eighth  year  of  his  age, 
Richard  Brinsley  Sheridan  had,  as  we  see,  a  literary 
aunt  and  grandaunt,  and  indeed  a  list  of  literary  rela- 
tives. His  son  Thomas  wrote  nothing,  but  had  a  share 
in  Drury  Lane  Theatre,   w^as   a   whig   politician,  and 


3GG  THE   MOTHER   OF   SHERIDAN. 

married  Catherine  Henrietta,  daughter  of  Colonel 
Collender,  of  Craig  Hall  in  Scotland,  and  grand- 
daughter to  the  Earl  of  Antrim.  He  died  in  1870,  at 
the  age  of  forty-three.  Among  his  six  children  two 
were  certainly  conspicuous  for  the  literary  talents  that 
belonged  to  the  Sheridan  family.  We  refer  to  Selina 
Sheridan,  who  married  in  1825  the  Hon.  Captain 
Blackwood,  son  of  Baron  Dufferin,  and  to  Caroline 
Elizabeth,  better  known  as  the  Hon.  Mrs.  Norton,  who 
in  her  old  age  was  again  married  to  her  lifelong  friend, 
the  late  Sk  William  Stirling  Maxwell.  The  third 
daughter,  Georgiana,  was  married  to  Lord  Seymour. 
As  Lady  Seymour,  she  was  Queen  of  Love  and  Beauty 
at  the  Eglintown  Tournament  in  1839,  and  subse- 
quently became  Duchess  of  Somerset,  wearing  the 
j)roudest  "  Strawberry"  coronet  in  England. 

The  latest  descendant  of  Donald  and  Denis  (Bible) 
Sheridan  of  Quilca,  who  has  shown  literary  talent  in 
addition  to  the  highest  qualities  of  a  statesman  and 
diplomatist,  is  the  son  of  the  above-named  Selina,  Lady 
Dufferin,  who  in  182.5  married  into  the  L'ish  Black- 
Avood  familv,  which  Avas  ennobled  in  1800  for  services 
rendered  to  William  Pitt's  ministry  in  the  formation 
of  the  Union.-  This  son  is  Earl  of  Dufferin  and  Vis- 
count Clandeboye,  who  VA^as  born  in  1826,  and  distin- 
guished himself  so  greatly  in  India,  and  as  Governor- 
General  of  Canada,  and  afterAvard  in  Constantinople. 
His  "Letters  from  High  Latitudes,''  Avritten  about 
thirty  years  ago,  is  still  quite  popular,  and  the  preface 
to  it  shows  that  Lord  Dufferin  has  some  of  the  heredi- 
tary Axit  of  the  Sheridans.  It  was  republished  in  Mon- 
treal, in  1873,  as  "  A  Yacht  Voyage  to  Iceland."    "  The 


ACCOUNT    OF   A    LOVE    MATCH.  367 

reader,"  observes  a  critic,  "in  taldng  up  the  book, 
may  be  amused  to  recognize  in  the  preface  something 
of  the  old  histrionic  turn  of  the  Sheridan  family,  for  it 
furnishes  the  list  of  the  yacht' s  crew  under  the  heading 
of  dramatis  personal^  viz. ,  Wyse,  a  returned  California 
digger ;  another  is  a  navigator,  another  cook  and 
butcher.  Along  with  mp^te,  five  seamen,  and  shipboy, 
we  find  '  Voice  of  a  French  Captain,'  an  '  Early  Village 
Cock,'  and  a  '  White  Bear' — all.  performers  in  that 
Arctic  melodrama  of  a  ship.  It  is  a  fancy  very  much 
like  the  manner  of  Richard  Brinsley  Sheridan,  espe- 
cially the  voice  of  the  French  captain,  hailed  no  doubt 
in  a  thick  fog,  under  the  lea  of  an  iceberg.  The  narra- 
tive of  the  voyage  is  of  the  same  lively  character, 
sprinkled  all  over  with  Sheridonian  felicities  of  sjoeech.' ' 
Lord  Duflerin,  who  is  great-grandson  to  Sheridan,  and 
therefore  great-great-grandson  to  Sheridan's  mother, 
has  also  wTitten  upon  Emigration,  and  the  Land  Tenure 
in  Ireland.  His  wife,  Lady  Dufferin,  is  granddaughter 
of  the  celebrated  Irish  patriot,  Archibald  Hamilton 
Rowans.  Her  maiden  name  was  Lady  Harriet  Sengine 
Hamilton,  and  she  is  the  author  of  "  Katy's  Letter," 
a  ballad,  and  "  The  Honorable  Impulsia  Gushington," 
a  young  lady  who  makes  a  sentimental  journey  up  the 
Nile  and  among  the  ancient  ruins  of  Egypt. 

The  following  is  a  more  detailed  account  of  the  first 
acquaintanceship  of  Sheridan's  mother  with  Thomas 
Sheridan  his  father,  then  manager  of  the  Dublin  Thea- 
tre. In  January,  1746,  Mr.  Kelly,  a  gentleman  from 
Galway,  having  insulted  and  considerably  alarmed  an 
actress  named  Bellamy  in  the  theatre,  Mr.  Sheridan 
interposed  in  her  behalf,  v/hen  Mr.  Kelly  became  so 


368  THE  MOTHER  OF  SHERIDAN. 

coarse  and  violent  that  the  manager  x)ersonally  chas- 
tised him.  A  combination  of  Galway  men  was  formed 
to  avenge  Mr.  Kelly.  With  that  object  they  aiTanged 
to  attack  him  in  the  theatre,  but  having  been  warned 
privately  of  his  danger,  he  prudently  abstained  from 
appearing  on  the  night  in  question.  This  only  in- 
creased the  fury  of  the  Galway  clique,  who  vented 
their  rage  at  missing  their  prey  by  such  serious  out- 
rages that  the  outbreak  was  called  "  Kelly's  riot." 

Trinity  College,  of  which  Mr.  Sheridan  had  been  a 
member,  together  with  the  better  class  of  citizens, 
espoused  Ms  cause,  and  among  the  warmest  of  these 
defenders  was  Edmund  Burke,  at  that  time  a  student 
at  the  Dublin  University. 

A  paper  war  was  then  commenced,  opened  by  a 
letter  in  favor  of  Mr.  Sheridan,  which  appeared  in  the 
Dublin  Journal,  January  25th,  1746.  This  was  fol- 
lowed by  an  anonymous  copy  of  verses,  from  the  pen 
of  Miss  Chamberlayne,  which  ultimately  led  to  an 
introduction  to  Mr.  Sheridan. 

But  in  vain  did  Miss  Chamberlayne  Avield  her  poeti- 
cal pen  in  behalf  of  her  hero  ;  and  a  pamphlet  that  she 
wrote  on  the  subject  met  with  no  better  success.  Party 
spirit  still  ran  high,  and  Mr.  Sheridan  and  his  friend 
Dr.  Lucas  were  marked  for  assassination,  and  a  horse 
was  kept  in  readiness  to  enable  the  murderer  to  make 
his  escape. 

So  violent  a  riot  occurred  at  the  theatre  one  night 
that  Mr.  Sheridan  was  acting  that  the  Master  of  the 
"Revels,  an  officer  like  that  of  Lord  Chamberlain  in 
fingland,  ordered  the  theatre  to  be  closed,  and  both 
sides  appealed  to  the  law. 


MARRIED   TO   SHERIDAN.  369 

Mr.  Slieridan  was  first  tried  for  assaulting  Mr.  Kelly, 
when  the  provocation  he  had  received  appeared  to  the 
jury  such  ample  justification  of  his  conduct  that  he 
was  immediately  acquitted.  Mr.  Kelly  was  then  tried 
for  the  mischief  done  at  the  theatre,  and  was  sentenced 
to  a  tine  of  five  hundred  pounds  and  three  months' 
imprisonment.  The  fine  was  remitted  at  the  generous 
request  of  Mr.  Sheridan,  and  he  himself  became  solici- 
tor and  bail  for  the  enlargement  of  the  man  who  had 
sought  his  life  and  injured  his  property. 

When  the  trouble  subsided  Mr.  Sheridan  was  intro- 
duced to  his  fair  champion,  at  the  house  of  his  sister, 
Mrs.  Sheen.  Both  parties  were  so  well  pleased  with 
each  other,  at  this  first  interview,  that  a  lively  attach- 
ment immediately  took  j)lace,  and  they  were  united  in 
1747,  when  the  lady  had  just  completed  her  twenty- 
second  year. 

For  some  years  after  her  marriage  the  life  of  Mrs. 
Sheridan  was  happy  and  prosperous  in  the  extreme. 
Indeed  the  only  drawback  to  her  felicity  was  the  loss 
of  her  oldest  child,  Thomas,  who  died  when  only  three 
years  old.  She  alternately  resided  at  Dublin  and  at 
the  farm  at  Quilca,  County  Cavan. 

The  cares  of  a  rising  family  fully  occuj^ied  the  time 
of  Mrs.  Sheridan.  Her  second  son,  Charles  Francis, 
was  born  in  June,  1750,  and  her  third,  the  celebrated 
Richard  Brinsley,  in  September,  1751.  Her  fourth 
child  was  a  daughter,  Alicia,  born  January,  1753,  who 
subsequently  became  Mrs.  Lefanu.  Her  son,  Lock- 
ville,  died  an  infant,  and  her  younger  daughter,  Anne 
Elizabeth,  was  born  some  years  afterward  in  London. 

Reverses,  however,  came,  and  abandoning  the  stage 


370  THE  MOTHER  OF  SHERIDAN. 

in  Dublin,  Mr.  Sheridan,  in  1758,  removed  with  his 
family  to  Henrietta  Street,  Covent  Garden,  and  in  1760 
took  art  engagement  at  Drury  Lane. 

The  brilliant  talents  of  Mrs.  Sheridan  soon  caused  her 
to  be  surrounded  by  some  of  the  chief  literary  charac- 
ters of  the  time,  among  them  Dr.  Johnson,  Dr.  Young, 
and  Samuel  Richardson. 

Although  in  her  "  Sidney  Biddulph"  Mrs.  Sheridan 
adopted  the  epistolary  form  of  Richardson's  novels, 
yet  she  avoided  his  jDrolixity,  and  used  to  say  that  in 
his  novels  the  bookseller  got  the  better  of  the  author. 

"  Sidney  Biddulph,"  perhaps,  i)resents  a  more  faith- 
ful picture  of  the  manners  of  middle  life,  in  the  early 
part  of  the  eighteenth  century,  than  the  works  of 
Richardson  ;  and  this  may  be  easily  accounted  for,  as 
Mrs.  Sheridan  drew  from  her  own  actual  observation 
of  the  circles  in  which  she  moved,  while  Richardson,  in 
attempting  to  portray  scenes  in  higher  life  than  his 
own,  could  only  write  from  imagination. 

In  the  composition  of  "Sidney  Biddulph*'  Mrs. 
Sheridan  appears  to  have  relied  entirely  upon  her  own 
abilities,  for  even  her  husband  was  not  consulted,  nor 
was  any  portion  of  the  story  communicated  to  him 
until  the  whole  was  completed.  It  is  recorded  of  her, 
that  it  was  her  custom  to  write  with  a  small  box  near 
her,  in  which  she  deposited  her  manuscript  whenever 
Mr.  Sheridan  entered  the  room. 

It  was  in  reference  to  the  education  of  her  daughter 
Alicia  that  Mrs.  Slieridan  received  from  Dr.  Johnson 
one  of  his  remarkable  "  snubbings."  On  his  observing 
the  little  Alicia's  love  for  literature,  and  lier  attentivelv 
reading  his   "Rambler,"   Mrs.    Sheridan  assured  him 


^iiarcc  anfoincttl 


DEATH   OF   MRS.   SHERIDAN.  373 

she  only  allowed  her  little  girl  to  read  works  of  such 
an  exceptional  nature.  "  Then  you  are  a  fool,  mad- 
am I"  vociferated  the  courtly  j)hilosopher.  "Turn 
your  daughter  loose  into  your  library  ;  if  she  is  well 
inclined,  she  will  only  choose  nutritious  food ;  if 
otherwise,  all  your  precaution  will  avail  nothing  to 
prevent  her  following  the  natural  bent  of  her  inclina- 
tions." 

Mrs.  Sheridan  accompanied  her  husband  on  Ms  visits 
to  Bath,  Bristol,  Edinburgh,  and  other  places.  At 
Bristol  a  singular  incident  occurred,  in  a  copy  of  verses 
being  addressed  to  her  husband  by  a  young  lady  of 
fifteen,  the  subsequently  famous  Mrs.  Hannah  More. 

In  1764,  with  a  view  to  economy,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Sheri- 
dan embarked  for  France,  in  order  to  ' '  make  both 
ends  meet"  on  the  pension  of  two  hundred  pounds  a 
year.  They  took  all  their  children  with  them,  except 
Richard  Brinsley,  who  was  left  under  the  care  of  Dr. 
Robert  Sumner,  the  headmaster,  and  Dr.  Parr,  the 
undermaster  of  Harrow. 

The  Sheridans  settled  at  Blois,  and  for  some  time 
the  mild  climate  of  France  had  a  beneficial  effect  upon 
the  health  of  Mrs.  Sheridan.  But  consumjDtion  had 
marked  her  for  its  victim,  and  Mr.  Sheridan  was  just 
on  the  eve  of  a  journey  to  Ireland  when  his  wife 
became  alarmingly  ill.  Fainting  fits,  followed  by 
extreme  debility,  were  the  chief  symptoms.  Her 
mental  powers  remained  unimpaired  to  the  last.  In  a 
few  nights  she  expired,  to  the  great  grief  of  her  hus- 
band and  children.  As  a  Protestant  she  could  not  be 
buried  in  the  Roman  Catholic  cemetery,  but  through 
the  kindness  of  friends  her  remains  were  deposited  in 


374  THE  MOTHER  OF  SHERIDAN. 

the  private  cemetery  of  a  Protestant  family,   seven 
miles  from  Blois. 

Although  not  handsome,  Mrs.  Sheridan  is  described 
as  having  had  an  intelligent  countenance,  fine  dark 
eyes  and  hair,  with  a  particularly  fair  complexion. 
From  an  accident  in  her  childhood  she  was  slightly 
lame,  and  could  not  walk  any  distance  without  assist- 
ance ;  latterly  she  used  an  ivory-headed  cane.  Her  hand 
and  arm  were  particularly  admired  for  the  beauty  of 
their  shape.  She  was  not  only  a  highly  intellectual, 
but  a  most  amiable  woman,  and  seems  to  have  endeared 
herself  to  all  who  knew  her. 


FRANCES  TROLLOPE,  THE  MOTHER  OF 
ANTHONY  TROLLOPE. 

It  is  bat  a  few  months  since  Anthony  TroUope  died, 
in  the  meridian  both  of  years  and  fame.  Whether  he 
was  entitled  to  the  appellation  of  a  great  man  must 
depend  altogether  upon  the  meaning  we  assign  to 
greatness.  It  is  certain  that  after  the  death  of  Thack- 
eray and  Charles  Dickens,  Anthony  Trollope,  together 
with  "  George  Eliot"  (Miss  Mary  Ann  Evans,  Mrs. 
George  Henry  Lewes,  and  then  shortly  before  her 
death  Mrs.  Cross)  and  Charles  Reade,  were  the  three 
most  popular  writers  of  English  fiction.  His  powers 
of  continuous  work  were  more  remarkable  than  those 
of  any  other  novelist  since  Sir  Walter  Scott.  Although 
engaged  in  a  government  position  at  the  London 
General  Post-Office,  Mr.  Trollope  found  leisure  not 
only  to  mix  freely  in  society  and  observe  keenly  the 
social  manners  of  his  time,  but  to  turn  out  two  or  three 
long  novels  in  the  course  of  a  year.  His  elder  brother, 
Thomas  Adolphus  Trollope,  is  also  well  known  as  an 
author,  and  having  lived  in  Italy  for  many  years  he 
has  written  several  romances  of  Italian  life,  such  as 
"Marietta,"  '' Guilio  Malatesta,"  "La  Beata,"  etc. 
He  is  also  the  author  of  a  "  History  of  Florence," 
"The  Girlhood  of  Catherine  de  Medici,"  and  "A 
Decade  of  Italian  Women. " 

Thomas  Adolphus,   however,   is  not  nearly  so  well 


376      THE  MOTHER  OF  ANTHONY  TROLLOPE. 

known  by  his  writings  as  Anthony,  and  to  the  latter  the 
title  of  being  a  great  novelist  and  social  writer  is  cer- 
tainly due.  As  both  the  brothers  inherited  tlieu'  liter- 
ary abilities  from  their  mother,  Frances  TroUope,  who 
was  born  in  1780  and  died  at  Florence  in  1863,  she  is 
in  our  judgment  entitled  to  a  place  among  the  mothers 
of  great  men. 

From  her  especially  Anthony  Trollope  inherited  his 
incessant  activity  and  never-ilagging  industry.  The 
day  has,  we  trust,  passed  away  when  Mrs.  Trollope  is 
to  be  judged  by  her  first  book  written  after  her  first 
visit  to  the  United  States  in  1829,  and  published  in 
England  three  years  subsequently.  It  would  be  as 
unfair  to  sentence  her  to  literary  death  because  of  her 
attacks  upon  our  manners  in  her  ' '  Domestic  Life  of 
the  Americans,"  as  it  would  have  been  to  refuse  to 
read  Charles  Dickens's  later  works  because  he  had 
laughed  at  some  phases  of  our  political  life  in  his 
"  American  Notes." 

In  forming  an  estimate  of  Mrs.  Trollope  as  an 
author,  however,  we  shall  find  that  quantity  rather 
than  quality  predominates.  Although  she  delighted 
in  satires  of  clerical,  political,  and  domestic  life  quite 
as  much  and  with  not  so  much  good  humor  as  her  son 
Anthony,  they  have  left  no  indelible  mark  upon  the 
age  in  which  he  lived,  and,  unlike  the  satires  of  Thack- 
eray and  the  humorous  and  pathetic  stories  of  Dickens, 
have  produced  no  change  in  the  feelings  and  manners 
of  the  people. 

It  was  not  till  she  had  passed  the  middle  of  life  that 
Mrs.  Trollope  began  to  write  at  all.  This  would  be  no 
necessary  disparagement  of  her  as  a  novelist,  since  the 


HER   TASTE   FOR   POLITICS.  377 

same  is  true  of  ''.George  EKot,'.'  who  only  began  to 
■uTite  her  matchless  fictions  after  her  union  in  midlife 
with  George  Henry  Lewes.  But  it  may  well  be 
doubted  if  the  genius  of  Mrs.  Lewes,  much  less  the 
mere  talent  of  Mrs.  Trollope,  could  produce  as  many 
novels  as  the  latter  did  that  would  be  worthy  of  sur- 
vival to  another  generation.  It  is  easier  perhaps  now- 
adays to  say  what  she  did  not  write  than  what  she  did 
write,  because  the  name  of  her  literary  progeny  is  legion. 

Satire,  as  we  have  said,  is  what  she  aimed  at,  and 
that,  so  far  as  her  talent  extended,  she  chiefly  suc- 
ceeded in.  Her  satire  on  American  social  life  is  found 
in  her  "  Domestic  Manners  of  the  Americans,"  which 
she  supijlemented  with  the  novel,  "  The  Refugee  in 
America."  This  was  in  1832,  and  in  the  following  year 
she  turned  her  attention  to  Italy,  and  in  addition  to  a 
descriptive  work  produced  a  novel,  '  •  The  Abbess, 
the  scenes  of  which  are  laid  in  an  Italian  convent  and 
under  the  nose  of  the  Inquisition. 

Politics  were  always  a  favorite  study  with  Mrs.  Trol- 
lope, and  from  first  to  last  she  was  an  uncompromising 
Tory.  Her  taste  for  polemical  romance  found  vent  in 
1836  in  the  "  Life  and  Adventures  of  Jonathan  Jeffer- 
son Whitlaw,"  an  apparent  prototype  of  Legree  in 
"  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,"  who  maltreats  those  whom 
quaint  old  Fuller  calls  "  God's  images  cut  in  ebony," 
on  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi. 

In  the  following  year  "The  Yicar  of  Wrenhill" 
made  his  appearance.  Mrs.  Trollope' s  purpose  in  this 
novel  was  to  show  up  a  clerical  hypocrisy  and  sham 
religion.  But  she  overdid  it,  and  even  a  favorable 
reviewer  at  the  time  spoke  of  the  character  of  the 


378  THE   MOTHER   OF   ANTHONY   TROLLOPE. 

vicar  as  ' '  not  merely  a  libel  on  the.  sect,  but  a  libel  on 
humanity." 

In  ''  Michael  Armstrong,"  another  of  her  stories,  the 
character  of  Sir  Matthew  Dowling,  whom  she  depicts 
as  a  coarse,  brutal,  and  detestable  scoundrel,  and  yet 
at  the  same  time  a  man  of  culture  and  mental  ambi- 
tioD,  must  also  be  pronounced  untrue  to  the  average 
possibilities  of  human  nature,  "•  Such  is  Mrs.  Trol- 
lope's  Manchester  model  man — the  representative  in  her 
Parliament  of  the  cotton  interest  .  .  .  the  pattern  of 
mill-owners  and  manufacturers.  And  this  vulgar 
oppressor  has  a  familiar  worthy  of  him  in  the  person 
of  Mr.  Joseph  Parsons — a  parasite  who  contracts  to  do 
his  principal' s  dirty  work  wholesale,  and  does  it  beauti- 
fully, breaking  the  hearts  and  the  homes  of  the  factory 
folks  after  a  magnilicent  system  of  his  own."  In  this 
political  novel  Mrs.  Trollope  attempted  to  do  in  one 
social  department  what  Charles  Dickens  so  successfully 
did  in  another.  But  she  had  not  the  power  which 
Dickens  so  marvellously  possessed  of  maldng  her  char- 
acters both  dramatic  and  real  to  us.  She  had  no  such 
dramatic  corps  as  Bumble,  and  Claypole,  and  Fagin, 
and  Bill  Sykes,  and  the  Artful  Dodger,  and  poor 
Nancy. 

"  The  Widow  Barnaby"  is  Mrs.  Trollope' s  best  crea- 
tion. The  widow  has  a  definite  X)ersonality  and  stands 
out  among  the  positive  quantities  of  the  English  novel. 
There  is  more  humor  in  this  story  than  in  the  rest  of 
her  novels.  Miss  Martha  Compton's  matrimonial  tac- 
tics make  up  a  rich  piece  of  comedy,  and  the  widowed 
career  of  this  same  adventuress  maintains  the  fun. 
The    Widow    Barnaby    has    been   well   described    as 


HER   NOVELS.  379 

''  showy,  strong-willed,  supple- tongued,  audacious, 
garrulous,  affected,  tawdry,  lynx-eyed,  indomitable  in 
her  scheming,  and  colossal  in  her  selfishness. "  In  the 
characters  that  support  or  show  off  the  widow  in 
stronger  relief,  Mrs.  Trollope  has  also  displayed  consid- 
erable skill.  Agnes  Willoughby's  artlessness  con- 
trasts well  with  her  guardians  systematic  art.  Aunt 
Betsy  is  a  good  old  soul,  and  Lord  Mucklebury'  s  flirta- 
tion with  the  widow  is  amusing.  Suj^plemental  novels 
seldom  improve  upon  the  first,  and  "  The  Widow  Mar- 
ried "  did  not  enhance  the  literary  reputation  of  the 
author  of  "  The  Widow  Barnaby." 

Her  novel,  ' '  One  Fault, ' '  is  the  story  of  a  persecuted 
wife,  whose  trials  are  minutely  analyzed,  but  it  is 
deficient  in  probability,  character,  and  artistic  finish. 
Its  moral  appears  to  be  to  show  the  mischief  of  extreme 
sensitiveness.  "  Charles  Chesterfield  ;  or.  The  Advent- 
ures of  a  Youth  of  Genius, "  is  descriptive  of  literary 
coteries,  and  this  novel  also  has  its  counterpart  in  her 
"  Blue  Bells  of  England."  The  subject  of  literary 
disappointment  has  been  worn  threadbare  both  before 
and  since  they  were  written. 

"  Hargrave ;  or.  The  Adventures  of  a  Man  of 
Fashion,"  followed  next,  and  was  more  successful. 
About  the  same  time  she  wrote  "  Jessie  Phillips,"  a 
pendant  to  her  "  Factory  Boy."  The  latter  attacked 
the  Poor  Laws,  the  former  the  factory  system,  as  they 
then  existed  in  England.  In  both  these  stories  she 
attempted  to  grapple  with  problems,  as  she  says,  "  of 
enormous  difficulty  and  stupendous  importance,"  but 
beyond  her  powers.  "  The  Laurringtons  ;  or,  Superior 
People,"    was  more  within  her  intellectual  compass, 


380      THE  MOTHER  OF  ANTHONY  TROLLOPE. 

and  was  accordingly  more  admired.  Among  lier  later 
fictions  are  "  The  Robertses  •  on  tlieir  Travels," 
"  Father  Eustace/'  "  The  Three  Cousins,"  ''  Town  and 
Country  ;  or,  The  Days  of  the  Regency, "  "  The  Young 
Countess,"  ''The  Lottery  of  Marriage,"  "Petticoat 
Government,"  "Second  Love;  or.  Beauty  and  Intel- 
lect," and  "Mrs.  Withers  ;  or,  Family  Mysteries." 

Such  a  quantity  of  literary  work  as  we  have 
described,  even  if  a  good  deal  of  it  was  not  of  a  high 
order,  entitled  Mrs.  TroUope  to  the  character  of  one  of 
the  most  active -minded  and  observant  writers  of  her 
own  or  any  other  age.  She  is  also  entitled  to  the  praise 
of  writing  with  a  moral  purpose,  that  of  reforming 
abuses  and  making  vice  and  folly  contemptible.  Gfoethe 
complained  that  the  modern  poets  put  too  much  water 
in  their  ink.  Mrs.  TroUope  may  justly  be  found  fault 
with  not  only  for  putting  too  much  milk  and  water, 
but  also  too  much  gall  into  her  descriptions  and  criti- 
cisms of  society.  Still  she  did  good.  It  is  always  good 
for  people  to  see  themselves  occasionally  as  others  see 
them,  and  although  her  sharp  and  stinging  satire  made 
her  un^Dopular  with  many  circles,  her  books  were  read 
and  her  pitiless  descrij)tions  of  characters  and  manners 
produced  a  salutary  effect. 

If  it  be  said  that  her  analysis  of  character  is  not  pro- 
found, it  may  be  answered  that  she  did  not  attempt  to 
analyze  profound  characters.  As  a  novelist  she  cannot 
compare,  for  the  pleasurable  and  healthy  feelings  she 
excites  in  the  reader,  with  Dickens  or  Thackeray,  or 
even  with  her  son  Anthony  TroUope.  The  last-named, 
however,  is  really  a  refined  and  modified  edition  of  his 
mother.     Both  of  them  delighted  in  the  observation  of 


A    SOCIAL    SATIRIST.  381 

commonplace  rather  than  of  exaggerated  human  cult- 
ure. Bishops,  deans,  parsons,  politicians,  village  gos- 
sips, town  beauties,  dinner-parties,  and  fashionable 
table-talk  were  the  stock  in  trade  of  both.  But  the 
son  s  stories  leave  a  far  pleasanter  taste  in  the  mouth 
than  the  mother' s.  If  she  did  not  achieve  much  in  the 
way  of  checking  vice  and  immorality,  yet  dealing  with 
superficial  peojDle  she  created  by  contrast  a  desire  for 
Teal  persons  and  sincere  actions  and  words.  It  is  non- 
sense to  call  her  unfeminine  ;  a  social  satirist  has  no 
sex,  and  if  she  criticised  the  life  around  her  merely 
from  a  feminine  standpoint,  her  observations  would  be 
far  less  trustworthy  than  when  she  does  so  as  an  intel- 
ligent human  being,  neither  asking  nor  giving  indul- 
gence or  quarter.  She  shows  no  mercy  ;  but  the  set  of 
people  she  took  off  deserved  no  mercy.  Although  she 
was  a  consistent  Tory  all  her  life,  her  political  satires 
cannot  be  called  untruthful  or  unjust.  She  is  neither 
exclusive  nor  sectarian.  She  as  readily  finds  the  weak 
spots  in  one  party  as  in  another.  She  proclaims  war 
to  the  knife  with  all  forms  and  manifestations  of 
hypocrisy  and  humbug,  whether  of  high  or  low  degree. 
The  attributes  of  penetration  and  fearlessness,  if  not  of 
perfect  impartiality,  must  be  allowed  her. 

Moreover,  such  writers  as  Mrs.  Trolloj^e,  who  make  a 
clean  sweep  of  the  whole  social  house  with  their  liter- 
ary broom,  do  an  amount  of  good  which  society  reluc- 
tantly acknowledges  by  abandoning  the  abuses  com- 
plained of,  although  it  will  not  acknowledge  that  it  is 
all  influenced  by  the  merciless  castigations  given  it. 
We  will  venture  more  than  this,  and  say  that  if  Mrs. 
Trollope  had  confined  her  satires  to  her  own  country 


382      THE  MOTHER  OF  ANTHONY  TROLLOPE. 

she  would  have  been  one  of  the  most  popular  of 
modern  novelists  in  onrs.  We  all  of  us  laugh  when 
she  takes  off  the  narrowness,  meanness,  scheming,  gin- 
drinking,  grammar-slaughtering,  and  pompous  pecul- 
iarities of  certain  types  of  English  people.  It  is  fifty- 
one  years  ago  since  Mrs.  Trollope  published  her 
"Domestic  Manners  of  the  Americans.'"  It  is  nev- 
er pleasant  to  endure  the  depreciatory  criticism  of 
strangers,  and  when  the  Quarterly  liei'iew  and  other 
Tory  journals  of  England  hailed  the  work  as  a  true, 
that  is,  a  complete  and  impaitial,  description  of  Ameri- 
can society  both  Xorth  and  South,  it  was  no  wonder  if 
our  national  i^ride  was  offended,  and  if  she  was  looked 
upon  as  a  spy  whose  only  object  in  coming  here  was  to 
"  see  the  nakedness  of  the  land,""  and  shut  her  eyes  to 
its  plenty.  The  manners  of  the  English,  however, 
have  been  criticised  bv  foreigners  at  various  times 
quite  as  severely  as  Mrs.  Trollope  criticised  ours.  At 
any  rate,  we  are  not  concerned  to  defend  the  idiosyncra- 
sies of  American  society  half  a  century  ago.  ]\Irs. 
Trollope  herself  confessed  that  she  met  with  relined 
and  genuine  people  both  Xorth  and  South,  who  formed 
an  important  and  socially  powerful  exception  to  the 
vulgar  coteries  she  described.  Ameiicans  of  culture  in 
our  own  day  are  scarcely  more  tolerant  of  the  aggressive 
traits  which  offended  Mrs.  Trollope  than  she  was.  But 
the  truth  is  that  the  social  aspect  of  ordinary  American 
life  has  undergone  a  vast  and  salutary  reformation 
during  the  last  fifty  years.  She  judged  of  society  by 
its  excrescences,  and  her  analysis  of  the  countrj^  was 
only  skin-deep.  Moreover,  there  is  a  great  deal  of  jus- 
tice in  her  criticisms  of  the  offensive  individualism  she 


HER   EXPERIENCE  IN   AMERICA.  383 

came  in  contact  with.  If  any  of  us  to-day  were  to 
encounter  the  same  persons  and  nuisances  we  should 
treat  them  with  as  little  reverence  as  she  did.  Hap- 
pily, those  x>ersons  and  nuisances  are  things  of  the 
past,  as  much  as  slavery,  which  does  not  seem  to  have 
shocked  her  as  an  institution,  althougli  she  disliked 
the  spirit  manifested  by  some  Southerners  toward  their 
slaves,  as  if  they  were  mere  chattels,  and  not  human 
]:)eings  at  all.  Thackeray  formed  a  very  different  esti- 
mate from  Mrs.  Trollox-»e  of  the  symimthy  generally 
existing  between  masters  and  slaves.  As  she  judged 
of  the  Xorth  by  odd  sjjecimens  that  attracted  her 
attention,  so  she  did  of  the  Southern  treatment  of  the 
colored  race.  The  relations  of  the  white  servants  in 
the  North  to  their  employers  disgusted  her  even  more, 
and  as  she  stayed  in  various  parts  of  the  country  for 
some  months  at  a  time,  the"helir'  question  came 
home  to  her  jjractically.  She  found  that  everj'  girl 
she  engaged,  however  illiterate,  ijiided  herself  upon 
being  "  a  lady,""  who  condescended  to  stay  with  her 
for  a  few  weeks  or  months  until  she  had  saved  a  few 
dollars  or  reyilenished  her  wardrobe.  Of  the  English 
idea  of  domestic  service  as  an  honorable,  respected,  and 
useful  calling,  she  found  no  trace  in  America.  In  this 
matter,  domestic  life  in  America  is  still  a  difRcidt  prob- 
lem, and  it  is  this  that  now  as  then  induces  so  many 
families  to  live  in  hotels  and  boarding-houses  rather 
than  to  "  keep  house."  Yet  there  is  nothing  more 
menial  or  dejiendent  in  domestic  service  than  in  a  girl's 
earning  her  daily  bread  with  far  more  strain  upon  her 
health  in  a  store  or  factory.  It  is  a  prejudice  which 
has  arisen  from  false  notions  of  what  dependence  and 


384  THE   MOTHER   OF    ANTHONY   TROLLOPE. 

independence  really  mean,  and  this  prejudice  has  done 
great  harm  to  the  social  and  domestic  life  of  America, 
and  still  continues  to  do  so.  A  secretary  or  amanu- 
ensis, a  coachman  or  a  steward  is  as  much  a  dependent 
upon  his  employer  as  a  girl  who  attends  to  the  house 
door  and  the  nursery.  Mrs.  TroUope  gave  offence  by 
writing  to  this  effect,  but  it  is  true  nevertheless.  True 
socialism  does  not  consist  in  having  no  masters  and  no 
servants,  for  that  is  impossible,  but  in  preserving  one's 
self-respect  and  the  respect  due  to  others  in  all  the 
relations  of  life.  Every  man  or  woman  who  has  to  live 
by  earning  money  in  exchange  for  services  is  a  servant. 
But  employers  are  themselves  dependent  upon  those 
whom  they  employ.  Mrs.  Trollope's  account  of  her 
"  helps''  was  certainly  of  a  discouraging  kind,  but  it  is 
still  ridiculously  common,  and  one  only  has  to  adver- 
tise for  help  to  find  it  out.  A  showy,  vulgar  girl 
thought  it  her  due  to  sit  at  meals  with  Mrs.  Trollope 
and  her  daughters,  and  was  amazed  at  being  relegated 
to  dinner  in  the  kitchen.  She  expected  also  the  same 
dresses  and  amusements  as  the  young  ladies  she  waited 
upon,  and  when  the  Misses  Trolloi)e  did  not  see  it  in 
that  light  they  were  accused  of  being  purse-proud 
upstarts.  Of  course  this  was  an  extreme  specimen  of 
the  "  helj),"  and  Mrs.  Trollope  may  have  erred  in  sup- 
posing it  a  representative  one.  Still,  there  are  girls  as 
ignorant  to-day,  who  despise  useful  handiwork  and 
imagine  that  any  lady  must  think  she  has  found  a 
treasure  in  engaging  such  a  one  as  her  "  companion." 
"I  do  not  care  for  children,  and  feel  myself  better 
fitted  to  be  a  companion  to  a  lady,"  is  even  now  a  fre- 
quent intimation  from  girls  seeking  a  living  and  having 

• 


HER   LIFE-LIKE   DESCRIPTIONS.  3S5 

their  daily  bread  to  earn.  Hence  the  majority  of  our 
"helps"  think  it  beneath  their  dignity  to  learn  any- 
thing useful. 

Whether  one  agrees  with  Mrs.  TroUope's  opinions  or 
not,  no  one  who  will  take  the  trouble  of  reading  her 
now  almost  forgotten  book  can  fail  to  find  both  instruc- 
tion and  amusement  from  some  of  her  realistic  descrip- 
tions. Her  pictures  of  the  revival  ancl  the  camp-meet- 
ing as  it  was  fifty  years  ago  are  almost  as  fresh  now  as 
when  they  were  written.  One  may  take  Mrs.  Trollope 
as  cicerone  to  Ocean  Grove  or  Martha's  Vineyard  and 
find  that  the  old  lady  had  both  eyes  and  ears,  and 
knew  how  to  use  them.  "  Suddenly  changing  his 
tone,"  she  says  of  a  revival  preacher,  "  which  had 
been  that  of  sober,  accurate  description,  into  the  shrill 
voice  of  horror,  he  bent  forward  his  head,  as  if  to  gaze 
on  some  object  beneath  the  pulpit,  and  made  known 
to  us  what  he  saw  in  the  j)it  which  seemed  to  open 
before  him.  The  device  was  certainly  a  happy  one  for 
giving  effect  to  his  description  of  hell.  No  image  that 
fire,  flame,  brimstone,  molten  lead,  or  red-hot  pincers 
could  supply,  with  flesh,  nerves,  and  sinews  quivering 
under  them,  was  omitted.  .  .  .  Would  they  avoid  the 
hell  he  had  made  them  see  ?  '  Come  then  ! '  he  con- 
tinued, stretching  out  his  arms  toward  them,  '  come 
to  us  and  tell  us  so,  and  we  will  make  you  see  Jesus, 
the  dear,  gentle  Jesus,  who  shall  save  you  from  it. 
But .  you  must  come  to  Him!  You  must  not  be 
ashamed  to  come  to  Him.  This  night  you  shall  teU 
Him  that  you  were  not  ashamed  of  Him  ;  we  wdll  make 
way  for  you  ;  we  will  clear  the  bench  for  anxious  sin- 
ners  to  sit  uj)on.     Come   then,   come  to  the  anxious 


3SG  THE   MOTHER   OF   ANTHONY   TROLLOPE. 

benches,  and  we  will  show  you  Jesus  !    Come  !    Come ! 
Come.'  " 

The  revivalist  characteristics  are  the  same  in  Mr. 
Moody's  day  as  they  were  in  Mrs.  Trollope's,  but  the 
style  resembles  as  much  that  of  Mr.  Sj)urgeon,  of  Eng- 
land, as  of  any  American  pulpiteer. 

The  appearance  of  a  female  lecturer,  who  discussed 
the  Bible  and  marriage  freely,  created  a  sensation, 
Mrs.  Trollope  tells  us,  even  among  Americans.  "  It 
Avould  have  made  some  stir  anywhere,"  she  thinks, 
' '  but  in  America,  where  women  are  guarded  by  a 
sevenfold  shield  of  habitual  insignificance,  such  a 
si^ectacle  caused  an  effect  that  can  hardly  be  described.' ' 
Had  this  keen  observer  lived  half  a  century  later  she 
would  scarcely  have  spoken  of  insignificance  as  the 
guardian  of  American  women,  and  assuredly  the  fact 
of  a  lecturer  being  a  woman  no  longer  causes  a  sensa- 
tion. 

In  short,  Mrs.  Trollope's  two  volumes  on  the  "  Do- 
mestic Manners  of  the  Americans"  are  interesting  as  an 
exaggerated,  but  nevertheless  partially  true,  account 
of  some  phases  of  social  life  in  the  early  part  of  this 
century.  Some  of  these  eccentric  manners  have  since 
then  crossed  the  Atlantic  and  become  naturalized  in 
the  mother  country,  especially  revivalism,  which  in  the 
imported  Salvation  Army  from  England  is  a  domestic 
and  social  nuisance  such  as  Americans  could  never  have 
invented.     Mrs.  Trollope's  looking-glass  has  two  sides. 


THE  WIFE  OF  BENJAMIN  DISRAELI. 

The  career  of  Benjamin  Disraeli,  Earl  of  Beacons- 
field,  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  of  modern 
times.  He  deserves  to  stand  in  the  first  rank  of  self- 
made  men,  yet,  like  other  self-made  men,  he  was 
indebted  to  circumstances  for  a  large  share  of  his  suc- 
cess. The  great  thing  with  such  brilliant  makers  of 
their  own  biography  as  well  as  of  the  history  of  the 
times  in  which  they  lived,  is  the  gift  of  taking  time  by 
the  forelock  and  turning  their  opjoortunities  to  the 
best  possible  account.  Ability  to  do  this  is  as  essen- 
tial to  success  as  any  quality  of  genius  or  intellectual 
attainment. 

The  late  Earl  of  Beaconsfield  owed  much  to  his 
father  in  the  way  of  literary  example  and  encourage- 
ment. For  the  convenience  of  consulting  books  in  the 
British  Museum,  Isaac  Disraeli  had  a  suite  of  apart- 
ments in  the  Adelphi,  London,  and  here  it  was  that 
his  son  Benjamin  first  saw  the  light  on  December  21st, 
1805.  "  I  was  born  in  a  library,"  he  used  to  say,  and  in 
his  last  illness  he  told  his  friend  Lord  Barrington  that 
the  room  he  was  born  in  "was  covered  with  books." 
The  literary  tastes  he  acquired  by  these  early  associa- 
tions, as  well  as  by  the  talents  he  inherited  from  his 
jjarents,  formed  in  later  years  the  happiness  of  his 
leisure,  and  no  doubt  enabled  him  to  bear  the  storms 
of  his  political  career  with  equanimity.    Indeed  we  find 


388  THE  WIFE  OF  BENJAMIN   DISRAELI. 

Mm  turning  from  one  of  his  earliest  political  disap- 
pointments, when  he  was  unable  to  obtain  a  seat  in 
Parliament,  to  the  novel-writing  which  subsequently 
became  his  chief  relaxation. 

On  the  10th  of  February,  1802,  the  elder  Disraeli 
married  Maria,  daughter  of  Mr.  George  Bassoi,  a  re- 
tired London  merchant,  who  resided  at  Brighton.  The 
family  was  of  Venetian  origin.  Benjamin  Disraeli's 
maternal  uncle,  like  his  father,  was  fond  of  literature,  a 
taste  which  the  fortune  which  he  had  acquired  in  busi- 
ness enabled  him  to  gratify.  Isaac  Disraeli  had  in- 
herited from  his  father  a  considerable  fortune,  which 
enabled  him  to  give  his  son  a  liberal  education  and  the 
advantages  of  foreign  travel.  His  mother  lived  until 
1847.  Very  little  is  recorded  of  her,  but  she  no  doubt 
was  worthy  of  the  husband  to  whom  she  was  a  beloved 
companion  for  fifty- five  years  of  wedded  life.  Of 
his  grandfather,  Benjamin  Disraeli,  after  ^vhom  he 
was  named,  the  great  statesman  and  author  has 
left  us  some  scattered  reminiscences.  In  1723  the 
Jews  were  permitted  to  acquire  land  in  England,  and 
in  1753  an  Act  of  Parliament  was  passed  to  naturalize 
them,  although  the  fanatical  ox)positi()n  it  created  led 
to  its  repeal  in  the  following  year.  In  1743  Henry., 
Pelham  became  Prime  Minister  of  England,  who  was 
known  to  be  favorable  to  the  Jews.  Tliis  led  to  manv 
foreign  Hebrews  settling  in  England,  among  whom  was 
Benjamin  D' Israeli,  the  grandfather  of  him  who  was 
to  become  twice  Prime  Minister  and  a  peer  of  the 
realm.  The  latter  describes  him  as  "  a  man  of  ardent 
character,  sanguine,  courageous,  speculative,  and  fort- 
unate, with  a  temper  which  no  disapiwintment  could 


A   STERN   JEWESS.  389 

disturb,  and  a  brain  amid  reverses  full  of  resource." 
When  thirty-five  years  old  he  married  Sarah  Yillareal 
de  Seproot,  a  descendant  of  the  Villareals  of  Portugal, 
a  lady  of  the  Jewish  race,  and  possessing  the  remark- 
able personal  attractions  so  often  seen  in  the  daughters 
of  Judah.  Her  grandson  writes  somewhat  severely  of 
her  disposition,  perhaps  forgetting  the  possibility  of 
her  having  transmitted  some  of  her  stern  qualities  to 
himself.  Although  she  never  ox^enly  renounced  her 
religion,  he  represents  her  as  having  a  contempt  for 
her  race,  "  a  feeling  which  the  vain  are  too  apt  to 
adopt  when  they  find  that  they  are  born  to  x^ublic  con- 
tempt." She  lived  to  the  age  of  eighty,  he  says, 
"without  indulging  in  a  tender  expression.'"  Her 
family  had  suffered  much  from  persecution  in  Portugal, 
and  perhajDS  the  sympathy  and  just  resentment  which 
he  himself  always  showed  for  the  sufferings  of  his  race 
mav  have  been  a  more  kindly  distillation  of  the  senti- 
ments  of  his  indomitable  grandmother. 

Her  husband  was  as  easy  and  good-tempered  as  she 
was  severe,  and  their  grandson  says  of  them  and  of  his 
father,  who  was  their  only  cMld  :  "•  Notwithstanding 
a  wile  who  never  pardoned  him  for  his  name,  and  a 
son  who  disappointed  all  his  plans,  and  who  to  the 
last  hour  of  his  life  was  an  enigma  to  him,  he  lived  till 
he  was  nearly  ninety,  and  then  died  in  the  full  enjoy- 
ment of  prolonged  existence."  The  only  son,  Isaac, 
added  to  his  father's  easy  disposition  intellectual 
powers  and  aspirations  to  which  he  was  a  stranger. 
Hence  he  was  a  disappointment  to  both  his  parents. 
His  famous  son  describes  him  as  "  a  pale,  pensive 
child,  with  large  lustrous  eyes,  delicate  features,  and 


300  THE   WIFE  OF  BENJAMIN   DISRAELI. 

hair  falling  in  ringlets  on  his  neck,"  and  as  inheriting 
his  mother's  beauty,  but  not  her  character.  Indeed  he 
describes  his  sensitive  and  imaginative  nature  as  made 
unhappy  by  her  want  of  sympathy.  ' '  Having  a  strong, 
clear  mind,  without  any  imagination,  she  believed  that 
she  beheld  an  inevitable  doom.  The  tart  remark  and 
the  contemptuous  comment  on  her  part  elicited  on  the 
other  all  the  irritability  of  the  jDoetic  idiosyncrasy. 
After  frantic  ebullitions,  for  which,  when  the  circum- 
stances were  analyzed  by  an  ordinary  mind,  there 
seemed  no  sufficient  cause,  my  grandfather  always 
interfered  to  soothe  with  good-tempered  common - 
X^laces,  and  promote  peace.'"  On  one  occasion,  the 
solitary  boy  ran  away  from  home,  but  was  brought 
back  by  his  father.  When  he  grew  up  he  showed  his 
carelessness  of  early  training  by  changing  his  name 
from  D'  Israeli  to  Disraeli  and  quietly  conforming  to 
Christianity.  His  son.  Lord  Beaconsfield,  was  bap- 
tized at  the  age  of  twelve  in  the  parish  church  of  St. 
Andrew's,  Holborn,  the  entry  on  the  register  being 
only  discovered  by  accident  in  1875. 

King  William  the  Fou'tth  died  in  June,  1837,  and  as 
is  always  the  case  on  the  accession  of  a  new  sovereign 
in  Great  Britain,  there  was  a  general  election.  This 
was  the  opportunity  for  which  Benjamin  Disraeli  had 
so  long  waited.  He  contested  the  borough  of  Maid- 
stone and  was  successful  in  defeating  the  Radical 
candidate.  The  colleague  of  Mr.  Disraeli  was  another 
Tory,  Mr.  Wyndham  Lewis,  of  Hughenden  Manor, 
Buckinghamshire.  Both  Mr,  Lewis's  wife  and  manor 
•were  in  due  season  destined  to  become  the  valuable 
possessions  of  Mr.    Disraeli.     It  was  the    wife    that 


BEFORE   THE   HOUSE  OF  COMMONS.  391 

brought  liim  the  manor  and  brought  him  not  only  a 
wealth  of  this  world's  goods,  but  of  what  was  of  far 
more  value  to  him,  domestic  affection  and  unwaning 
sympathy  and  friendship. 

On  the  20th  of  November  in  the  same  year,  1837,  the 
young  Queen  Victoria  delivered  her  first  speech  to  the 
assembled  Parliament ;  and  among  the  members  of 
the  House  of  Commons  who  listened  at  the  bar  was 
Benjamin  Disraeli,  now  in  the  thirty-second  year  of 
his  age,  and  who  had  waited  fiv^e  years  for  his  seat  in 
the  House  of  Commons.  On  December  7th,  two  weeks 
and  a  half  afterward,  his  own  voice  was  first  heard  in 
the  House.  "  A  singular  figure,  looking  pale  as  death, 
with  eyes  fixed  on  the  ground,  and  ringlets  clustering 
round  his  brow,  asked  the  indulgence  which  was 
usually  granted  to  those  who  spoke  for  the  first  time." 
He  was  already  known  as  a  clever  romance -writer  and 
a  youth  of  exquisite  but  rather  showy  costume,  and 
he  had  to  stand  a  good  deal  of  banter  about  the 
"Wondrous  Tale  of  Alroy,"  and  "  Contarini  Flem- 
ing." Laughter  and  cries  of  "  Question"  interrupted 
him  continually.  He  was  irritated  and  confused. 
"If,"  he  exclaimed,  "  honorable  gentlemen  think  this 
is  fair,  I  will  submit.  I  would  not  do  it  to  others,  that 
is  all."  He  then  attempted  to  deliver  the  peroration 
he  had  prepared,  but  shouts  of  ridicule  drowned  his 
sentences.  He  sat  down,  but  not  until  he  had  spoken 
those  memorable  words  :  "I  am  not  at  all  surprised  at 
the  reception  which  I  have  experienced.  I  have  begun 
several  things  many  times,  and  I  have  often  succeeded 
at  last.  I  will  sit  down  now,  hut  the  time  will  come 
when  you  will  hear  me."     It  was  perhaps  some  conso- 


392  THE    WIFE   OF   BENJAMIN    DISRAELI. 

lation  to  him  that  the  London  Times  described  this 
maiden  effort  as  "an  eloquent  speech."  A  week  after- 
ward he  spoke  brieliy  again  and  received  better  treat- 
ment. In  three  months  more  he  tried  again,  and  when 
he  had  been  a  member  only  six  months  the  House  lis- 
tened to  him  with  marked  attention. 

The  year  1839  was  in  one  respect  the  most  important 
of  his  life,  for  it  was  the  year  of  his  marriage.  His 
colleague  in  the  representation  of  Maidstone,  Mr. 
Wyndham  Lewis,  had  died,  and  his  widow  became  the 
wife  of  Benjamin  Disraeli.  She  was  the  only  daughter 
of  Captain  John  Viney  Evans,  R.N.,  of  Bampford 
Speke,  Devonshire,  and  niece  and  heiress  of  General 
Sir  James  Viney,  K.C.H.,  of  Taignton  Manor,  Glouces- 
tershire. By  this  marriage,  as  we  have  said,  he  be- 
came the  owner  of  Hughenden  Manor. 

This  ancient  manor  is  a  handsome  structure,  built 
on  an  eminence  in  the  midst  of  a  well- wooded  park  of 
one  hundred  and  forty  acres,  and  commanding  exten- 
sive and  beautiful  views.  The  village  is  about  two 
miles  to  the  north  from  High  Wycombe,\in  a  pictu 
resque  spot,  surrounded  by  w^oodlands  of  great  beaaty. 
The  parish  church  of  Hughenden,  w^hich  is  dedicated 
to  St.  Michael  and  All  Angels,  includes  portions  of  a 
structure  dating  from  the  N^orman  times,  but  a  com- 
plete restoration  and  considerable  additions  were  made 
in  1875.  The  tower  has  a  peal  of  six  bells,  two  of 
which  were  hung  in  the  reign  of  Edward  the  Third, 
and  two  in  that  of  Charles  the  Second.  In  the  interior 
of  the  church  are  interesting  monuments  of  the  De 
Montfort  family.      Lord  Beaconsfield    was  a  regular 


LADY    BEACONSFIELD.  393 

attendant  at  the  parish  church  whenever  he  was  resid- 
ing at  Hughenden. 

On  the  brow  of  a  hill,  near  Hughenden  Manor,  is  a 
column  to  the  memory  of  Isaac  Disraeli,  who  died  on 
the  19th  of  January,  1848,  in  his  eighty -second  year, 
having  survived  his  wife.  Lord  Beaconsfield' s  mother, 
only  a  few  months.  The  monument  was  erected  by 
Mrs,  Benjamin  Disraeli,  his  daughter-in-law,  who 
subsequently  became  Countess  of  Beaconsfield,  some 
years  before  her  husband  became  an  earl. 

The  history  of  her  elevation  redounds  to  the  credit 
of  her  husband  as  well  as  of  herself.  She  had  been  a 
potent  factor  in  the  moulding  of  his  i^olitical  destiny, 
and  to  her  he  always  attributed,  gratefully  and  no 
doubt  truly,  a  great  portion  of  his  success  in  states- 
manship. She  was  herself  a  woman  of  remarkable  in- 
telligence, not  only  in  literature,  but  in  political  situa- 
tions. Her  advice  was  often  sought  by  her  husband, 
and  always  relied  upon.  So  great  was  her  devotion  to 
him  that  one  night,  when  they  were  being  driven  to  the 
House  of  Commons  where  he  was  to  make  the  leading 
speech  from  the  opposition  benches  upon  some  mo- 
mentous question,  she  refrained  from  uttering  a  cry 
of  pain  when  the  footman  closed  the  carriage  door 
upon  her  finger.  He  dedicated  his  novel  "  Sibyl"  to 
her  in  these  words  : 

"  I  would  inscribe  these  volumes  to  one  whose  noble 
spirit  and  gentle  nature  ever  prompt  her  to  sympathize 
with  suffering  ;  to  one  whose  sweet  voice  has  often 
encouraged,  and  whose  taste  and  judgment  have  ever 
guided  their  pages  ;  the  most  severe  of  critics,  but  a 
perfect  wife." 


394  THE   WIFE   OF   BENJAMIN    DISRAELI. 

In  a  public  speech  at  Edinburgh,  in  1867,  he  spoke 
of  his  partner  as  "  that  gracious  lady  to  whom  he  owed 
so  much  of  the  hapi^iness  and  success  of  his  Ufe." 

Benjamin  Disraeli  never  forgot  insults  and  injuries , 
like  those  heaped  upon  him  by  O'  Connell,  but  neither 
did  he  forget  loving-kindnesses  and  affection  such 
as  he  received  from  his  wife.  It  was  in  February, 
1868,  when  the  failing  health  of  the  late  Earl  of 
Derby  compelled  him  to  resign  the  Premiership,  that 
her  Majesty  Queen  Victoria,  by  his  advice,  sent  for 
Benjamin  Disraeli,  then  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer, 
and  appointed  him  Prime  Minister,  or  First  Lord  of 
the  Treasury.  In  December  of  the  same  year  he 
resigned  office,  Mr.  Gladstone  and  the  Liberals  hav- 
ing defeated  the  Conservatives,  on  an  appeal  to  the 
country.  The  Queen,  with  whom  Disraeli  in  his  earlier 
days  had  not  been  a  favorite,  but  who  appreciated  his 
later  efforts  to  save  the  fabrics  of  Church  and  State,  at 
once  offered  him  a  coronet.  With  the  dignity  of  a  man 
who  felt  that  his  services  to  his  country  deserved 
recognition,  and  yet  who  had  no  desu'e  for  personal 
reward,  he  begged  that  the  honor  might  be  transferred 
to  his  wife.  Mrs.  Disraeli  accordingly  was  created 
Viscountess  Beaconsfield,  while  her  husband  remained 
the  Right  Hon.  Benjamin  Disraeli. 

Relieved  from  the  c^res  of  office  which  he  was  after- 
ward to  reassume,  Mr.  Disraeli  found  a  resource  in  his 
old  hobby  of  novel-writing,  and  "  Lothair"  was  written 
in  1870.  It  was  reported  that  when  he  published  his 
first  novel,  liis  father,  Isaac  Disraeli,  had  exclaimed, 
"  Dukes  !  what  does  my  son  know  about  dukes  'i  He 
never  saw  one  in  his  life  I"     His  last  novel  showed  that 


AT   HUGHENDEN   MANOR,  395 

he  had  learned  something  about  them  in  the  interval. 
He  was  an  earl,  and  if  he  had  lived  longer  would  have 
been  made  a  duke  himself. 

Lord  Ronald  Grower,  in  his  "  Reminiscences,"  gives 
an  account  of  two  visits  he  made  to  Hughenden  Manor, 
one  before  and  one  after  the  death  of  Lady  Beacons- 
field.     He  says  : 

"  On  coming  down  to  the  library  before  dinner,  I 
found  Mr.  Disraeli  and  Lady  Beaconsfield,  the  poor 
old  lady  sadly  altered  in  looks  since  London— death 
written  on  her  face — but,  as  usual,  gorgeously  dressed. 
The  only  other  guests  in  the  house  besides  W.  H.  and 
myself  were  Lord  and  Lady  John  Manners.  ...  At 
dinner  I  sat  next  to  Lady  Beaconsfield.  Mr,  Disraeli 
was  evidently  very  anxious  about  her,  and  although 
occasionally  flashing  out  in  conversation  with  all  his 
curious  play  of  arms  and  shrugging  of  the  shoulders, 
he  was  evidently  much  depressed  at  her  state.  His 
attention  to  her  was  quite  touching,  and  '  Mary  Ann,' 
as  he  sometimes  called  her,  was  constantly  appealed 
to.  .  ,  .  The  drawing-room  is  a  terribly  gaudy 
apartment,  very  lofty,  and  the  walls  all  green  paper, 
dotted  with  fleurs-de-lis  and  adorned  with  large 
panelled  brown  carved  wood  or  composition  frames, 
which  are  the  only  relief  to  this  green  wilderness  of 
wall.  On  asking  my  host  why  he  had  not  paintings 
within  these  frames,  especially  in  the  one  above  the 
fireplace,  '  I  had  intended,'  he  answered,  '  her  picture 
(Lady  Beaconsfield's)  to  be  placed  there ;  but  she  has 
never  sat  for  her  portrait  except  to  Ross  for  a 
miniature  ;  but  some  day  I  shall  have  that  copied  life 
size  and  placed  in  that  frame.' 


396  THE   WIFE  OF  BENJAMIN    DISRAELI. 

******* 

"In  tlie  evening  Mr.  Disraeli  spoke  very  despond- 
ingly  about  his  wife's  state  of  health.  '  She  suffers,' 
he  groaned,  '  so  dreadfully  at  times.  We  have  been 
married  thirty-three  years,  and  she  has  never  given  me 
a  dull  moment.'  It  was  quite  touching  to  see  his  dis- 
tress. His  face,  generally  so  emotionless,  was  filled 
with  a  look  of  suffering  and  woe  that  nothing  but  the 
sorrow  of  her  he  so  truly  loves  could  cause  on  that  im- 
passive countenance We  visitors  all  left  soon 

after  twelve.  It  was  a  miserably  wet  day,  and  this 
seemed  to  add  to  the  melancholy  feeling  we  had  that 
we  should  iDrobably  never  again  see  poor  old  Lady 
Beaconsfield,  who,  with  many  oddities  as  to  dress  and 
manners,  is  certainly  a  most  devoted  wife  and  com- 
panion." 

Queen  Victoria's  regard  for  him  in  his  later  days  is 
well  known.  She  even  paid  a  visit  to  Hughenden 
Manor  and  planted  an  oak  there.  But  the  companion 
and  confidante  of  his  life  had  passed  away.  Lady 
Beaconsfield  died  in  December,  1872,  at  an  advanced 
age,  and  left  the  bereaved  statesman  at  "  the  darkest 
hour  of  his  existence.''  The  day  of  the  funeral,  which 
was  conducted  with  as  little  ceremony  as  a  humble 
village  funeral,  it  rained  hard  and  the  wind  blew  in 
strong  gusts,  but  nevertheless  the  grief-stricken  hus- 
band walked  bareheaded  behind  the  coffin  to  the  vault 
door.  In  her  death  he  had  lost  the  one  person  upon 
whom  he  had  bestowed  the  strongest  affections  of  his 
nature,  and  he  never  recovered  from  the  blow.  He  con- 
stantly alluded  to  her  as  his  "  dear  wife,"  and  said  she 
had  been  his  "good  angel."     On  the  11th  of  Augu.st, 


DEATH  OF  LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  397 

1876,  Benjamin  Disraeli  made  his  last  speech  in  the 
House  of  Commons,  and  accepted  the  earldom  which 
had  been  offered  him  nearlj^  eight  years  before. 

Amid  the  tears  of  his  servants  and  the  sorrow  of  his 
friends  Lord  Beaconsfield  passed  away  on  the  19th  of 
April,  1881,  towaM  the  early  hours  of  morning.  A 
public  funeral  was  offered  by  the  Premier,  Mr.  Glad- 
stone, but  declined  by  the  executors,  for  the  great 
statesman's  will  showed  that  he  had  never  forgotten 
the  faithful  wife  and  friend  who  had  preceded  him  to 
the  grave  nine  years  before.  It  read  simply :  "I 
desire  and  direct  that  I  may  be  buried  in  the  same 
vault  in  the  churchyard  of  Hughenden  in  which  the 
remains  of  my  late  dear  wife,  Mary  Anne  Disraeli, 
created  in  her  own  right  Viscountess  Beaconsfield, 
were  placed,  and  that  my  funeral  may  be  conducted 
with  the  same  simplicity  as  hers  was." 


THE  MOTHEE  OF  GARFIELD. 

Is  there  any  other  country  in  the  world  where  the 
worthy  poor  have  such  an  opportunity  as  ours  ;  where 
the  widowed  mother  may  so  surely  count  upon  the 
ways  and  means  to  rear  her  children,  and  to  see  them 
educated  ? 

Is  there  any  factor  so  important  to  success  for  a 
man  in  any  field  of  work  as  that  he  should  have  had  a 
wise  mother  'i 

Francis  Galton,  in  his  "  Hereditary  Genius,"  says 
on  this  latter  point : 

"  A  child  who  has  an  ahle  mother  has  the  good 
fortune  to  be  delivered  from  the  ordinary  narrowing, 
partisan  influences  of  home  education.  Our  race  is 
essentially  slavish  ;  it  is  the  nature  of  all  of  us  to 
believe  blindly  in  what  we  love,  rather  than  in  that 
which  we  think  most  wise.  We  are  inclined  to  look 
upon  an  honest,  unshrinking  pursuit  of  truth  as  some- 
thing irreverent.  We  are  indignant  when  others  pry 
into  our  idols  and  criticise  them  with  impunity,  just  as 
a  savage  flies  to  arms  when  a  missionary  picks  his 
fetish  to  pieces.  Women  are  far  more  strongly  in- 
fluenced by  these  feelings  than  men  ;  they  are  blinder 
partisans  and  more  servile  followers  of  custom.  Happy 
are  they  whose  mothers  did  not  intensify  their  naturally 
slavish  dispositions  in  childhood  by  the  frequent  use 
of  phrases  such  as,  '  Do  not  ask  questions  about  this  or 


AN   OHIO   WIDOW.  399 

that,  for  it  is  wrong  to  doubt,'  but  who  showed  them 
by  practice  and  teaching  that  inquiry  may  be  ab- 
solutely free  without  being  irreverent,  that  reverence 
for  truth  is  the  parent  of  free  inquiry,  and  that  in- 
difference or  insincerity  in  the  search  after  truth  is  one 
of  the  most  degrading  of  sins." 

The  mother  of  Garfield  was  such  a  woman  as  Galton 
describes  a  child  happy  in  possessing  as  a  mother. 
There  was  nothing  narrowing  or  jiartisan  in  the  home 
training  she  gave  her  offspring  ;  on  the  other  hand  they 
had  a  larger  outlook,  by  reason  of  their  hereditary 
inheritance,  than  thousands  of  children  of  their  day 
had  reared  in  homes  of  wealth.  The  dignity,  firmness, 
and  self-respecting  independence  with  which  life  was 
met  by  this  Ohio  mother,  took  away  the  sting  of  pov- 
erty from  her  children,  every  one  of  whom  grew  up  to 
usefulness  and  honor. 

Mrs.  Eliza  Garfield,  alone  with  her  children  in  her 
cabin  in  the  wilderness  fifty  years  ago,  realized  that  life 
was  a  stern  fact  to  her,  and  poverty  its  condition.  A 
widow  with  four  children  on  a  farm  encumbered  by 
debt,  and  with  no  money  to  provide  the  barest  necessi- 
ties of  life,  she  must  have  possessed  a  brave  heart  to 
reject  the  advice  given  her  by  a  neighbor  to  sell  her 
home  and  go  back  to  her  friends  in  the  East. 

The  advice  was  like  a  stab,  but  it  did  her  good.  She 
was  startled  from  her  hopeless  despondency  by  such 
words,  and  looking  at  her  visitor  said  :  "  Go  away  and 
leave  my  husband  in  the  wheat-field  ?  Never  !  I  can't 
do  that !"  There  was  a  reaction  in  her  feelings  after 
that,  and  her  resolution  was  formed  from  that  hour. 
She  would  stay  near  the  grave  of  her  husband,  whose 


400  THE   MOTHER   OF   GARFIELD. 

body  she  "had  buried   so   recently,  and  lier  children 
would  grow  up  in  sight  of  his  graue. 

Her  eldest  child  was  a  boy  of  eleven  years,  and  with 
him  she  talked,  having  no  one  else  to  confer  with,  re 
garding  her  plans.  .She  told  him  of  their  situation 
and  the  advice  given  her,  and  the  sturdy  lad  replied  in 
tones  of  firmness  and  boyish  ambition,  "  I  can  plough 
and  plant,  mother,  I  can  cut  wood  and  milk  the  cows. 
I  want  to  live  here,  and  I  will  work  real  hard."  The 
mother  felt  reassured,  and  her  boy-farmer  kept  his 
word.  His  was  a  life  of  toil,  but  love  sweetened  toil  in 
the  widow  Garfield's  home,  and  her  example,  coupled 
with  her  tender  affection  for  her  children,  made  them 
ambitious  and  industrious.  She  worked  hard,  and 
they  worked  with  her.  The  wheat-field  in  which  she 
had  buried  her  husband's  body  was  not  fenced  in,  and 
with  her  own  hands  she  split  rails  and  built  a  fence 
around  it.  The  resolution  she  exhibited  in  her  efi;ort 
to  keep  her  children  together,  the  self-denial  she 
practised,  and  the  careful  training  she  gave  her  sons 
and  daughters,  prove  her  to  have  been  a  brave  and  a 
strong-minded  woman.  Toil  as  she  would,  her  scanty 
supply  of  food  was  fast  becoming  exhausted,  and  she 
had  no  money  to  buy  more.  Without  letting  her  chil- 
dren know  it,  she  put  them  upon  a  daily  allowance, 
and  when  she  found  that  the  corn  she  had  would  not 
last  until  harvest-time  for  four,  she  denied  herself  a 
portion  and  lived  upon  two  and  then  upon  one  meal  a 
day.  All  the  time  she  worked  in  the  field  and  taxed 
lier  strength  to  its  utmost  to  save  her  children  from 
want.  They  never  felt  it,  but  she  did,  and  she  never 
lost  the  deep  lines  of  care  that  anxiety  and  hunger 


HER  EXCELLENT  ANCESTRY.  401 

brought  upon  her  face  in  those  early  days  of  widow  - 
hood.  They  are  the  honorable  scars  she  received  in  a 
fierce  and  noble  warfare  with  want.  "With  the  ripen- 
ing of  the  grain  and  the  coming  of  fresh  vegetables 
hunger  and  starvation  stared  them  in  the  face  no 
longer.  They  were  abundantly  supplied,  and  the 
grateful  woman  rejoiced  that  the  danger  was  past  and 
her  household  was  saved.  Her  eldest  son  was  now  a 
boy  of  eleven  years  of  age,  and  his  sisters  were  next 
him  in  age.  James,  the  youngest,  was  three  years  old, 
and  was  the  idol  of  his  brother  and  sisters.  The  char- 
acter of  this  eldest  brother  was  noble  and  unselfish. 
As  a  child  he  took  upon  himself  the  cares  of  a  man,  and 
he  never  laid  them  down  until  his  mother  was  above 
want.  He  hired  himself  out  to  do  farm-work  for  a 
neighbor  at  twelve  dollars  a  month,  and  with  his  first 
week's  wages  he  bought  his  little  brother  the  first  pair 
of  shoes  which  the  child,  then  four  years  of  age,  ever 
had.  He  likewise  paid  a  part  of  the  cost  of  James's 
schooling.  The  eldest  sister,  to  enable  this  pet  brother 
to  go  so  far  to  school,  carried  him  on  her  back,  and  the 
wise  mother  worked  for  all  and  provided  for  them  as 
comfortably  as  she  could. 

Mrs.  Garfield  was  a  descendant  of  the  Huguenots, 
and  her  ancestor,  Maturin  Ballon,  settled  in  Cumber- 
land, Rhode  Island,  after  the  revocation  of  the  Edict  of 
Xantes.  Maturin  Ballou  was  a  preacher,  and  he  built 
a  church,  wliich  still  stands,  and  is  known  as  "  El. 
der  Ballou' s  Meeting- House. "  The  ten  generations 
that  succeeded  him  were  preachers.  Hosea  Ballou, 
founder  of  Universalism  in  the  United  States,  was  one 
of    his    descendants,  and  Eliza  Ballou  was  another. 


402  THE   MOTHER   OF   GARFIELD. 

She  inherited  from  this  long  line  of  preachers  the  traits 
that  characterized  her — executive  ability,  perseverance, 
ambition,  fortitude,  and  indomitable  courage.  It  is 
then  eaSy  to  understand  how  she  was  able  to  face  such 
adversity  as  she  knew,  and  hoAv  she  overcame  it  in  the 
end.  She  belonged  to  a  family  whose  record  was  one 
of  the  best  in  this  country.  Her  husband  and  she  had 
been  i3laymates  in  childhood,  and  he  followed  her 
family  from  New  York  to  Ohio  some  years  after  they 
had  removed  there,  drawn  thither  by  his  unconquered 
love  for  her.  When  tliev  were  married  his  home  was  a 
log-cabin,  eighteen  by  twenty  feet,  containing  but  one 
room.  All  the  furniture  in  it  he  had  manufactured, 
and  the  young  wife  was  proud  of  it  and  of  him,  and  he 
was  too  happy  to  think  of  aught  else  than  his  young 
wife  who  had  come  to  cheer  and  keep  his  i:)ioneer 
home.  Abram  Garfield  was  a  man  who,  under  fairer 
circumstances,  might  have  made  a  great  career.  He 
was  a  wise  and  noble  man,  and  was  jiossessed  of  great 
strength  of  character.  The  hardships  of  his  life  and 
care  of  his  little  family  drove  all  thoughts  of  personal 
advancement  from  him,  and  he  worked  day  by  day  to 
make  them  a  home.  He  died  when  his  fourth  child  was 
a  little  babe,  and  left  a  home  which  his  faitlif ul  wife, 
by  herculean  effort,  was  able  to  keep  and  finally  to 
clear  of  debt.  Had  he  lived,  his  children  would  have 
had  a  happier  childhood  perhaps,  but  they  would  not 
have  been  more  wisely  instructed  than  they  were.  The 
history  of  a  domestic  woman  is  written  in  the  lives  of 
her  children,  and  nowhere  else.  Only  incidentally  are 
mothers  referred  to  in  the  generality  of  biographies. 
They   are    honored    only    by    men  who    are  morally 


A   PIONEER  REFORMER.  403 

as  well  as  intellectually  great.  A  well-kno\%Ti  writer 
has  said :  "  Great  men  have  usually  high  moral 
natures,  and  are  affectionate  and  reverential,  inasmuch 
as  mere  brain  without  heart  is  insufficient  to  achieve 
eminence.  Such  men  are  naturally  disposed  to  show 
extreme  filial  regard,  and  to  publish  the  good  qualities 
of  their  mothers  with  exaggerated  praise." 

Fortunately  for  this  mother  her  sons  were  mor- 
ally great,  and  he  who  of  her  children  attained  to 
great  public  popularity  loved  and  revered  his  mother 
with  such  tenderness  as  to  color  all  his  life's  actions 
and  to  unite  their  fames  permanently. 

Mrs.  Garfield  was  a  devout  member  of  the  Society  of 
Disciples,  and  she  instructed  her  children  systemati- 
cally in  Bible  study.  The  Sabbath  day  she  kept  holy, 
and  she  invariably  read  the  Bible  and  explained  to  her 
youthful  audience  what  was  not  apprehended  by 
them.  Her  Bible  teaching  took  the  place  of  church 
service,  for  there  was  no  church  near  enough  for  them 
to  attend.  On  week-days  she  read  four  chapters  regu- 
larly, and  the  family  circle  discussed  the  histories  of 
Moses,  Isaiah,  and  Paul  as  they  sat  at  meals  or 
gathered  about  the  evening  fire. 

She  was  a  pioneer  reformer,  and  her  children  were 
zealously  taught  temperance,  love  of  liberty,  and 
loyalty  to  their  government. 

It  was  the  widow  Garfield  who,  from  her  scanty 
acres,  gave  the  land  to  build  a  school-house,  in  order 
that  her  children  and  those  of  her  neighbors  might 
have  the  benefit  of  schooling  all  the  year  round.  She 
it  was  who  proposed  the  erection  of  the  school-house, 
and  who  urged  and  encouraged  the  idea  until  it  was 


404  THE   MOTHER   OF   GARFIELD. 

successfully  carried  out.  Her  brother-in-law  was  a 
member  of  the  Church  of  the  Disciples,  and  he  organ- 
ized a  congregation  in  the  school-house,  where  the 
merits  of  the  Disciples  as  a  sect  were  discussed,  and 
where  the  controverted  religious  questions  of  the  day- 
were  carefully  considered. 

Her  eldest  son  left  her  to  accept  work  in  the  clear- 
ings of  Michigan,  and  the  younger  brother  took  his 
place  on  the  farm  ;  and  in  addition  to  his  daily  work 
he  learned  the  carpenter's  trade  sufficiently  to  earn  a 
dollar  a  day  while  yet  a  boy.  The  first  day's  pay  he 
took  home  to  his  mother,  and  poured  out  the  pennies 
into  her  lap.  He  was  barefooted,  and  clad  in  jean 
trousers  of  her  manufacture,  but  in  his  heart  he 
was  the  happiest  of  boys,  and  his  mother  felt  that  she 
was  the  mother  of  a  Great  Heart.  The  eldest  son 
had  set  this  example  to  the  younger  brother,  for  his 
six  months'  earnings  for  cutting  wood  in  the  wilder- 
ness he  took  to  his  mother  and  gave  her  to  build  a 
house.  Not  a  thought  of  themselves  had  these  boys  ; 
only  for  their  mother  they  toiled,  and  the  children 
were  fathers  to  the  men,  for  in  all  the  years  of  their 
lives  they  considered  her  first,  themselves  last.  They 
loved  her  because  she  was  worthy  of  tlieii*  love,  and 
they  made  sacrifices  for  her  sake  because  she  had  made 
them  freely  for  their  sakes.  They  worked  away  from 
home,  and  as  the  years  passed  on  they  both  went  from 
home  to  live,  but  "  mother"  was  the  loadstar  in  all 
times  and  places.  She  lived  to  see  her  two  daughters 
settled  in  life,  her  eldest  son  a  highly  respected  citizen, 
and  her  youngest  son  to  pass  from  college  to  the 
church,  to  the  halls  of  legislation,  and  to  the  army. 


'  '  Xa, 


THE  MOTHER  OF   PRESIDENT   GARFIELD. 


THE    INAUGURATION   CEREMONIES.  407 

He  was  spared  to  return  to  her  after  the  war,  and  was 
sent  to  Congress.  When  he  was  nominated  for  the 
Presidency  in  1880,  at  the  Chicago  Republican  conven- 
tion, Mrs.  Garfield  came  into  greater  prominence,  and 
her  brave  life  was  a  familiar  story  in  all  parts  of  the 
country. 

At  his  inauguration  in  Washington,  on  the  4th  of 
March,  1881,  which  attracted  thousands  of  people  to 
the  capital,  Mrs.  Garfield  was  a  participator.  She  rode 
with  her  daughter-in-law  to  the  Capitol,  and  sat  during 
the  ceremonies  of  the  inauguration  beside  Mrs.  Garfield. 
When  the  oath  of  office  had  been  administered,  and 
President  Garfield  had  reverently  kissed  the  Bible  and 
sealed  his  compact  with  the  nation  to  rightly  ad- 
minister its  law  for  the  term  for  which  he  was  chosen, 
when  thousands  of  eyes  rested  upon  him  to  see  the  next 
act  in  the  drama  being  enacted,  in  the  presence  of  the 
foreign  dignitaries  and  leading  men  of  the  country, 
he  turned  to  his  aged  mother,  who  had  been  uncon- 
sciously weeping  during  the  delivery  of  his  address, 
and  kissed  her  ;  then  he  kissed  his  wife — the  two 
persons  of  all  the  world  most  interested  -with,  him  in 
the  events  they  had  witnessed.  The  act,  the  most  un- 
expected at  that  moment,  called  forth  cheers  from  the 
multitude  who  witnessed  it,  and  the  one  incident  of  the 
Inauguration  the  most  impressed  upon  all  w^ho  saw  it 
was  the  tribute  paid  his  mother  and  wife  by  the  Presi- 
dent. Wherever  the  soldiers  wandered  in  Washington 
during  that  day,  wherever  the  news  was  flashed  over 
the  wires  to  the  distant  sections  of  our  own  country  or 
to  foreign  lands,  was  heard  this  sentence  :  "  The  Presi- 
dent kissed  his  mother." 


408  THE  MOTHER  OF  GARFIELD. 

Widow  Garfield  was  welcomed  to  the  White  House 
by  the  nation.  The  first  mother  of  a  President  who 
had  ever  occupied  the  presidential  mansion  with  her 
son,  she  was  looked  upon  as  the  only  guest  of  the  kind 
the  country  had  ever  known,  and  she  was  the  most 
popular  woman  in  the  land  immediately.  All  the  inci- 
dents of  her  widowed  life  in  Ohio  were  told  and  retold 
in  the  newspapers,  and  ' '  Mother  Garfield' '  was  of  more 
interest,  if  not  more  importance,  than  her  son. 

The  world  knows  true  merit  when  it  is  before  it,  and  it 
delights  to  recognize  it.  IN'ot  a  dissenting  voice  objected 
to  the  i)laudits  uttered  in  j^raise  of  the  noble  woman  who 
had  come,  a  representative  mother,  to  sit  in  the  house 
of  the  Presidents  and  share  the  honors  of  high  place 
with  her  children.  The  press  of  the  country  hardly 
had  done  with  their  reiterated  praise  of  her,  when  one 
morning  in  July,  as  she  sat  at  the  house  of  her 
daughter  in  Ohio,  whither  she  had  gone  to  spend  the 
summer,  word  was  brought  her  that  her  son  was  shot. 
When  she  realized  the  import  of  what  her  daughter 
was  trying  to  tell  her,  in  the  gentlest  manner  possible, 
she  exclaimed  suddenly,  "  The  Lord  help  me.''  Then 
as  the  telegrams  were  read  her,  and  she  knew  all,  her 
only  remark  was,  "  How  could  anybody  be  so  cold- 
hearted  as  to  want  to  Idll  my  baby  V  The  man  at  the 
head  of  the  nation,  but  he  was  still  her  baby,  the 
youngest  of  her  children,  and  she  was  growing  old. 
Witliout  the  slightest  traces  of  excitement  in  her  man- 
ner, she  waited  for  the  news  that  was  sent  to  her  con- 
stantly of  the  President's  condition,  and  when  there 
was  no  strength  left  to  meet  the  news  expected,  she 
would  retire  to  her  own  room  and   remain  secluded 


DEATH   OF  HER  SON.  409 

until  tlie  control  she  required  had  been  gained  by  quiet 
prayer.     Wherever  the  people   gathered  to  read  the 
bulletins,  or  hear  the  purport  of  the  Washington  news, 
there  we  heard  words  of  tender  sympathy  for  the  aged 
mother.     The  chivalric  devotion  her  son  had  paid  to 
her,  and  the  anxious  care  he  had  manifested  on  her  ac- 
count from  the  moment  he  was  shot,  endeared  her  to 
the  people  as  it  had  himself.     Wherever  there  were 
human  beings  to  express  sympathy  there  it  was  ex- 
pressed, and  the  sorrow  of  the  people  was  as  one  per- 
son.    It  touched  the  heart  of  the  aged  woman,  and 
helped  her  to  wait  through  the  weary  weeks  of  illness 
for  the  end  that  was  inevitable.     And  when  the  Presi- 
dent died  she  did  not  fail  in  courage  or  give  up  in 
despair.     She  went  to  Cleveland  to  meet  the  funeral 
cortege,  and  was  there  joined  by  her  eldest  son,  who, 
as  in  the  days  of  his  youth,  threw  the  loving  arm  of 
protection  around  her  and  tried  to  soothe  her.     It  is 
remarkable  that  she  did  not  sink  under  the  strain  put 
upon  her.     The  death  of  her  son  under  any  circum- 
stances would  have  deeply  affected  her,  and  the  added 
excitement  and  sorrow  of  the  people  were  enough  to 
prostrate  her.     There  were  in  Cleveland,  the  day  she 
reached  there,  thousands  of  people  w^ho  had  gone  from 
all  parts  of  the  country  to  attend  the  funeral.     The 
sympathy  of  the  public  and  the  presence  of  so  many 
mourners  were  enough  to  weaken  her  to  prostration. 
But  she  quietly  assured  those  about  her  of  her  inten- 
tion to  follow  her  son' s  remains  to  the  grave,  and  as 
she  walked  beside  the  grief-stricken  widow  she  seemed 
as  firm  as  she.     Tlie  funeral  ceremonies  were  the  most 
imposing  ever  witnessed  in  this  country,  and  the  old 


410  THE   MOTHER   OF   GARFIELD. 

mother  noted  the  mourning  emblems  everywhere 
present  as  she  rode  along  the  streets  to  the  park  where 
the  obsequies  were  held.  Mrs.  Garfield  had  not  seen 
the  President  since  she  left  Washington,  a  few  weeks 
after  the  inauguration,  when  she  parted  with  him  in 
the  height  of  health  and  hap])iness.  Now  she  was 
sitting  beside  the  coffin  which  held  all  that  remained 
of  him.  The  thought  was  too  much  to  bear  com- 
j)osedly,  and  impelled  by  the  irrepressible  yearning  of 
her  mother's  heart,  she  arose  and  walked  to  the  head 
of  the  casket,  where  she  covered  her  face  in  her  hands 
and  stood  bowed  in  grief.  The  thousands  who  ob- 
served her  wept  from  sympathy  with  her. 

The  years  are  passing  onward,  and  President 
Garfield's  death  is  a  thing  of  the  past.  The  people 
forget  him  not,  nor  yet  the  aged  mother  who  lives  her 
last  days  bereft  of  her  son,  who,  but  for  the  assassin's 
shot,  would  in  all  probability  have  lived  to  comfort  her 
last  years  and  receive  her  dying  blessing.  She  lives, 
but  the  joy  of  living  has  departed  from  her,  for  how- 
ever tender  the  living  may  be  to  her  she  cannot  part 
with  the  memory  of  her  son,  and  v/liile  that  memory 
remains  existence  to  her  cannot  be  brightened.  She 
has  lived  a  long  life,  and  one  so  full  of  beauty  that  the 
word  '' mother"  has  increased  lustre  added  to  it,  and 
all  women  have  additional  honor  in  her  fame. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  ALEXANDER  VON" 
HUMBOLDT. 

The  fame  of  Alexander  von  Humboldt  has  cast  into 
the  shade  that  of  his  elder  brother  William,  who  was 
great  as  a  statesman,  a  critic,  and  a  linguist,  and  who 
was  well  able  by  himself  to  confer  celebrity  on  his 
family  had  the  vast  scientific  attainments  of  his 
brother  Alexander  not  centred  upon  him  the  attention 
of  the  world.  In  describing  the  mother  of  Von  Hum- 
boldt, however,  we  are  describing  the  mother  of 
William  von  Humboldt. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  trace  the  Von  Humboldt  ances- 
try to  remote  generations.  Alexander  George,  the  son 
of  Hans  Paul  von  Humboldt,  was  born  at  Zamenz,  in 
Pomerania,  in  1720,  and  was  the  father  of  the  brothers 
AYilliam  and  Alexander  von  Humboldt.  He  was  edu- 
cated for  the  army,  and  entered  the  military  service  of 
Prussia  in  1736,  and  served  in  a  regiment  of  dragoons 
under  Lieutenant- General  von  Platen.  Although  he 
distinguished  himself  in  three  campaigns,  he  did  not 
receive  any  higher  promotion  than  that  of  major,  and 
therefore  left  the  army  in  1762.  He  was  appointed  by 
the  King  of  Prussia  to  the  office  of  chamberlain  in  1764, 
and  was  attached  to  the  household  of  the  Crown  Prince. 
Two  years  after  he  received  this  appointment  he  formed 
an  attachment  for  Marie  Elizabeth  von  Colomb,  the 
widow  of  Baron  von  Hollwede,  to  whom  he  was  united 


412      THE   MOTHER   OF   ALEXANDER   VON   HUMBOLDT. 

in  marriage  in  1766.     William  and  Alexander  were  the 
issue  of  this  marriage. 

Shortly  after  his  marriage  he  resigned  his  a^Dpoint- 
ment  in  the  royal  household  and  devoted  himself  to  the 
improvement  of  his  residence  and  to  works  of  philan- 
thropy and  literary  taste.  He  died  in  1779,  at  the 
comparatively  early  age  of  fifty-nine,  and  was  mourned 
by  his  countrymen  as  a  patriot  and  by  his  associates 
as  a  friend. 

To  the  fidelity  and  intelligence  he  disj)layed  must  be 
attributed  the  resi:)ect  in  which  he  was  held  by  Fred- 
erick the  Great,  with  whom,  during  the  seven  years' 
war,  he  was  on  terms  of  confidential  communication. 
"  I  have  told  Humboldt  everything,"  writes  the  great 
soldier-king  on  one  occasion.  A  letter  from  the  Eng- 
lish ambassador,  in  the  year  1776,  describes  Major  von 
Humboldt  as  "  a  man  of  good  understanding  and 
estimable  character,"  and  mentions  him  as  one  of  the 
most  likely  of  the  capable  men  to  occuj^y  the  office 
of  minister  to  the  future  monarch,  Frederick  William 
the  Second. 

It  is,  however,  with  the  mother  rather  than  the 
father  of  the  two  Humboldts  that  we  are  immediately 
concerned.  He  was  forty-six  when  he  married  her,  and 
her  former  husband  was  but  recently  deceased.  Her 
father,  as  we  have  said,  was  Johann  Heinrich  von 
Colomb,  Director  of  the  East  Friesland  Chamber,  and 
was  cousin  to  the  lady  who  subsequently  became 
Princess  of  Blilcher.  It  was  to  her  that  the  Humboldt 
family  owed  their  considerable  landed  proi")erty. 
From  her  mother  she  inherited  the  house  No.  22 
Jagerstrasse,  Bei'lin,  where  Alexander  was  born,  on  the 


ERA   OF   GREAT   MEN.  413 


14th  of  September,  1769.  His  full  name  was  Frederick 
William  Henry  Alexander,  and  that  of  his  brother 
William,  who  was  born  at  Potsdam  on  June  22d,  1767, 
was  Frederick  William  Christian  Charles  Ferdinand. 
It  has  been  remarked  that  the  year  of  Alexander  von 
Humboldt's  birth,  1769,  was  that  of  the  birth  of 
several  other  eminent  men,  as  Napoleon  the  First ;  his 
victor  at  Waterloo,  Arthur,  Duke  of  Wellington ; 
George  Canning,  the  British  statesman  ;  Cuvier,  the 
naturalist  ;  and  Chateaubriand,  who  has  been  men- 
tioned in  these  pages  as  largely  indebted  to  his  mother. 
At  the  time  of  Alexander  von  Humboldt's  birth  the 
military  fame  of  Frederick  the  Great,  King  of  Prussia, 
was  at  its  height.  Kant,  the  Scotch-German  meta- 
physician, was  writing  his  "  Critique  of  Pure  Reason," 
Lessing  was  astonishing  the  intellect  of  Germany,  and 
Goethe,  although  only  twenty  years  of  age,  was  already 
famous  throughout  his  own  country  and  Europe, 

In  the  baptismal  register  of  the  Cathedral  of  Berlin 
we  find  that  his  baptism,  which  took  place  on  October 
19th,  1769,  was  performed  by  the  chaplain  of  the  King, 
and  that  the  Crown  Prince,  afterward  King  Frederick 
William  the  Second,  Prince  Henry  of  Prussia,  the 
Hereditary  Prince  of  Brunswick,  and  Duke  Ferdinand 
of  Brunswick,  were  his  sponsors.  The  remarkable  fact 
has  already  been  noticed  that  his  mother's  name  was 
the  same  as  that  of  Christopher  Columbus,  Colon,  or 
Colomb.  Alexander  von  Humboldt  has  been  justly 
called  "the  scientific  discoverer  of  America"  in  the 
nineteenth  century,  as  Columbus  was  its  geograiDhical 
discoverer  in  the  fifteenth. 

Marie  Elizabeth  von  Colomb  was  descended  from  an 


414      THE   MOTHER   OF   ALEXANDER   VON   HUMBOLDT. 

ancient  noble  family  who  liad  fled  from  Burgundy  on 
the  revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes.  She  was  able  to 
confer  upon  her  sons  a  better  heritage  even  than  the 
world-famous  name  of  her  family.  She  was  possessed 
of  unusual  administrative  talent,  and  as  a  German  his- 
torian says  of  her,  ' '  she  had  received  an  education  be- 
fitting women  of  her  rank,  and  united  to  these  advan 
tages  an  extensive  knowledge  of  the  world  and  the 
possession  of  a  considera})le  fortune.  Her  endeavors 
were  latterly  directed  toward  the  reformation  of  her 
son  by  her  first  marriage,  who  had  frequently  caused 
her  great  anxiety,  while  her  desire  for  her  two  younger 
sons  was  to  see  them  distinguished  by  everything  that 
was  attainable  in  intellectual  and  moral  culture." 

Owing  to  the  premature  death  of  her  husband,  the 
education  of  these  two  sons  devolved  upon  their 
mother,  and  so  generous  was  her  desire  that  they 
should  both  be  thoroughly  equipped  for  distinction  in 
life,  that  she  even  mortgaged  a  part  of  her  property  in 
order  to  meet  the  expenses  of  their  education.  It  had 
been  the  intention  of  Madame  von  Humboldt  origi- 
nally to  send  forth  her  sons  at  an  early  age  into  the 
world  of  politics  and  fashion,  where  their  interest  at 
the  Prussian  Court,  owing  to  the  confidence  which  had 
formerly  been  reposed  by  the  King  in  their  father, 
would  have  secured  their  promotion.  She  decided 
wisely,  however,  to  secure  the  services  of  the  ablest 
tutors,  and  to  enable  her  sons  to  enjoy  the  society  of 
ihe  most  intelligent  men  of  the  time.  Accordingly  she 
retired  with  thera  to  the  country  mansion  at  Tegel, 
which  was  the  most  considerable  property  left  by 
Major  von  Humboldt.     The  house  is  only  distant  eight 


A  WISE  MOTHER.  415 

miles  from  Berlin,  from  wliicli  metropolis  it  is  separated 
by  extensive  pine  woods.  It  was  at  this  beautiful 
country  house,  which  looks  upon  the  most  picturesque 
part  of  the  country  and  the  river,  that  the  family  re- 
tired. 

It  was  here  that,  in  1778,  before  the  death  of  Major 
von  Humboldt,  Goethe  was  a  welcome  guest,  on  the 
occasion  of  the  only  visit  he  ever  paid  to  Berlin,  and 
the  influence  which  the  Frau  von  Humboldt  had  upon 
the  future  lives  of  her  sons  can  scarcely  be  overesti- 
mated, and  yet  it  was  indirect  rather  than  personal.  It 
was  by  the  excellent  tutors  she  provided  for  them,  and 
by  keeping  their  attention  concentrated  on  their  studies, 
that  she  laid  the  foundation  of  their  future  greatness. 
It  does  not  appear  that  she  was  herself  a  woman  of 
genius,  or  that  she  could  boast  of  any  qualifications 
than  those  of  a  refined,  ai)preciative,  and  considerate 
mother.  One  of  the  tutors  she  engaged  for  them  was 
Kunth,  to  whose  able  instruction  in  all  the  branches  of 
a  liberal  education  they  were  for  ten  years  indebted. 
!N^either  of  the  brothers  was  remarkable  for  quickness 
in  learning,  and  of  Alexander,  who  was  far  the  less 
robust  of  the  two,  it  has  been  recorded  that  he  could 
only  learn  his  daily  lessons  by  dint  of  extraordinary 
effort.  In  this  respect  he  has  been  compared  to 
Albertus  Magnus,  the  learned  philosopher  of  the  Mid- 
dle Ages,  who  was  so  dull  as  a  boy  that  his  teachers 
quite  despaired  of  ever  teaching  him  to  read.  And  in 
this  instance  again  we  see  exemplified  the  fact  that  the 
race  is  not  always  to  the  swift,  nor  the  battle  to  the 
strong. 

The  mother  and  the  sons  were  not  ungrateful  to  the 


41G      THE   MOTHER   OF   ALEXANDER   VON    HUMBOLDT. 

tutor  for  the  pains  lie  took  with  them.  Until  they 
entered  the  University  of  Gottingen,  they  attended 
no  school  or  a-vmnasium.  William  von  Humboldt 
thus  describes  their  years  of  pupilage,  in  a  letter  to  a 
friend:  "You  ask  where  I  Avas  residing  in  1796  and 
the  following  years.  My  mother  only  resided  there 
during  the  winter,  but  my  youngest  brother  and  I  con- 
tinued there  through  the  summer  with  a  tutor,  riding 
07er  to  Tegel  usually  of  a  Sunday.  This  was  my  mode 
of  life  till  the  autumn  of  1788,  when,  accompanied 
by  the  same  tutor,  I  entered  with  my  brother  upon 
college  life  at  the  university,  then  existing  at  Frank- 
fort on  the  Oder,  where  I  remained  till  the  Easter 
of  1789.  I  went  soon  after  with  my  tutor  to  Grot- 
tingen,  leaving  my  brother  still  at  Frankfort.  Once 
established  at  Gottingen,  I  bade  farewell  to  my  tutor, 
and  from  that  moment,  when  twenty-two  years  of 
age,  I  was  thrown  upon  my  own  responsibility.  It 
was  not  till  the  Easter  of  1790  that  my  brother  joined 
me  at  Gottingen." 

The  friendship  of  Kunth  with  both  the  brothers  Von 
Humboldt  remained  unbroken  daring  the  ensuing  fifty 
years,  until  his  death  in  1829,  and  while  their  names 
were  becoming  famous  in  the  world,  the  elder  as  a 
statesman,  the  younger  as  a  man  of  science,  the  old 
tutor  continued  to  watch  their  progress  with  the  same 
interest  and  affection. 

Their  mother  showed  her  gratitude  to  him  by  settling 
upon  him,  as  early  as  1782,  a  yearly  pension  of  four 
hundred  gold  florins  a  year,  "  for  the  faithful  manner  in 
which  he  had  conducted  the  entire  education  of  my  two 
younger  sons,"  and  the  gift  was  continued  to  him  by  a 


DEATH   OF   MRS.    HUMBOLDT.  417 

legacy  in  her  will.  Herr  Kunth  continued  as  long  as 
he  lived  to  act  as  administrator  of  Alexander  von 
Humboldt's  property.  Even  after  he  had  resigned  his 
tutorship  and  accepted  employment  from  the  Govern- 
ment, he  remained  a  member  of  Frau  von  Humboldt' s 
household,  until  her  death,  which  occurred  in  1796. 
The  intimate  friendship  felt  for  him  by  the  family,  and 
reciprocated  by  himself,  w^as  evinced  by  the  fact  that 
his  remains  were  buried  near  the  family  vault  of  the 
A"on  Humboldts  at  Tegel.  It  is  mentioned  as  a  noble 
trait  in  the  character  of  Frau  von  Humboldt,  that  by 
her  will  she  set  apart  five  hundred  thalers  to  be  irre- 
deemably secured  upon  the  estate  of  Falkenberg,  the 
interest  of  which  at  four  per  cent  was  to  be  applied 
perpetually  for  the  preservation  of  the  church  tower 
and  family  grave,  with  the  provision  that  the  excess  of 
interest  was  to  be  applied  to  raise  this  capital  to  one 
thousand  thalers  ;  the  interest  from  which,  after  de- 
ducting the  necessary  amount  for  repairs,  was  again  to 
accumulate  for  the  formation  of  an  additional  capital 
of  five  hundred  thalers.  The  interest  of  this  third 
capital  was  to  be  applied  to  increasing  the  salary  of  the 
schoolmaster  at  Falkenberg,  while  the  accumulated 
savings  of  the  one  thousand  thalers  above  mentioned 
were  to  be  expended  on  the  improvement  of  the  school, 
in  suitable  alterations  in  the  buildings,  and  in  the 
purchase  of  necessary  books,  for  all  of  which  an  exact 
account  was  to  be  rendered.  The  administration  of 
this  endoAVTuent,  which  is  still  in  existence,  was  vested 
in  the  consistory  of  the  province. 

The  death  of  his  mother  put  Alexander  von  Hum- 
boldt in  the  possession  of  ample  means  to  gratify  his 


418     THE  MOTHER  OF  .ALEXANDER  VON   HUMBOLDT. 

long-clierished  purpose  of  visiting  the  tropics.  He 
therefore  resigned  his  place  under  the  state  that  he 
might  devote  himself  exclusively  to  science.  Refer- 
ring to  her  death,  he  writes  :  "I  had  long  been  pre- 
pared for  this  event.  It  has  not  taken  me  by  surprise  ; 
rather  have  I  felt  comforted  that  at  the  last  she 
suffered  so  little.  She  was  only  one  day  worse  than 
usual,  only  for  one  day  were  her  sufferings  more  than 
ordinarily  severe.  She  expired  without  a  struggle. 
You  know,  my  dear  friend,  that  this  is  not  an  event 
by  which  my  heart  will  be  very  deeply  wounded,  for 
we  have  always  been  strangers,  more  or  less,  to  one 
another  ;  but  who  could  have  remained  unmoved  at  the 
sight  of  her  unremitting  sufferings  f'  To  another 
friend  he  wrote  :  "A  happy  release  has  been  granted 
to  my  poor  mother.  On  the  mere  ground  of  humanity, 
her  release  was  to  be  desu^ed." 

The  nature  of  her  malady  is  not  mentioned,  but  her 
ill-health  is  referred  to  very  early  in  the  memoirs  of 
her  sons.  In  giving  these  sons  a  thorough  education, 
Frau  von  Humboldt  did  for  them  what  was  of  more 
value  than  silver  and  gold.  But  for  this  Alexander 
might  never  have  been  the  benefactor  he  became  to 
his  age,  for  even  if  he  had  felt  the  same  ambition  for 
scientific  discovery,  he  would  have  found  it  far  more 
difficult  to  pursue  it  to  such  enduring  results.  At  the 
same  time,  in  educating  her  sons  beyond  her  own 
a^ttainments,  the  mother  continually  increased  the  dis- 
tance between  herself  and  them,  so  that  it  is  not  sur- 
prising to  note  that  they  failed  to  feel  toward  her  the 
same  affection  that  would  have  existed  had  she  not 
put  them  from  her  by  making  them  her  superiors. 


A  LIFE  OF   SACRIFICE.  419 

Her  almost  continued  separation  from  them  also 
widened  the  gulf,  so  that  she  found  her  only  recom- 
pense for  her  sacrifices  in  their  behalf  in  the  lives  of 
usefulness  and  honor  they  led,  and  for  which  she  had 
fitted  them. 


THE  WIFE  OF  LORD   WILLIAM  RUSSELL. 

Few   characters   in    English   history  have   a   more 
I)athetic  interest  than  that  of  Lord  William,  whose  ex- 
ecution for  alleged  high  treason  in  the  reign  of  Charles 
the  Second  was  declared  to  have  been  "murder"  by 
a  vote  of  the  House  of  Commons  in  the  very  beginning 
of  the  reign  of  William  and  Mary.     There  is  no  crime 
out  of  the  many  which  "  the  merry  monarch"   com- 
mitted which  the  apologists  for  the  House  of  Stuart 
find  it  more  difficult  to  jjalliate  than   the  attainder, 
sham  trial,  and  beheading  of  one  of  the  noblest  adhe- 
rents of  constitutional  government  in  England.     When 
William  the  Third    created  his  father,   the  venerable 
Earl  of  Bedford,  a  duke,  among  the  reasons  for  confer- 
ring this  highest  rank  of  nobility  upon  him  is  alleged 
in  the  king's  patent  as  "  not  the  least  that  he  was  the 
father  to  Lord  Russell,  the  ornamenc  of  his  age,  whose 
great  merits  it  was  not  enough  to  transmit  by  history  to 
posterity  ;  but  they  [the  king  and  queen]  were  willing 
to  record  them  in  their  royal  patent,  to  remain  in  the 
family  as  a  monument  consecrated  to  his  consummate 
virtue,  whose  name  could  never  be  forgot  so  long  as 
men   preserved   any  esteem  for  sanctity  of  manners, 
greatness  of  mind,  and  a  love  to  their  country  constant 
even  to  death.    Therefore,  to  solace  his  excellent  father 
for  so  great  a  loss,  to  celebrate  the  memory  of  so  noble 
a  son,  and  to  excite  his  worthy  grandson,-  the  heir  of 


LADY  RACHEL'S  FATHER.  421 

suc]i  miglity  hopes,  more  cheerfully  to  emulate  and 
follow  the  example  of  his  illustrious  father,  they 
entailed  this  high  dignity  upon  the  earl  and  his  pos- 
terity."      • 

Lord  William  Russell,  so  unfortunate  in  a  false 
accusation  and  unfair  trial,  and  an  unjust  death,  was 
fortunate  indeed  in  the  possession  of  a  wife  as  noble, 
as  faithful,  and  as  high-minded  as  himself.  Lady 
Russell  did  honor  to  an  illustrious  parentage.  Her 
maiden  name  was  Lady  Rachel  Woristhesley,  the 
second  daughter  of  Thomas  Woristhesley,  Earl  of 
Southampton,  and  of  his  first  wife,  Rachel  de  Rou- 
vigny.  When  she  was  born,  about  the  year  1636, 
Charles  the  First  was  king,  and  the  troubles  that 
resulted  in  civil  war  and  the  loss  of  his  head  were  al- 
ready looming  up,  though  as  yet  "  no  bigger  than  a 
man's  hand."  Lady  Rachel's  father,  commemorated 
by  Bishop  Burnet  years  afterward  as  "  the  wise  and 
virtuous  Southampton, ' '  was  of  noble  birth  and  great 
w^ealth,  and  had  succeeded  to  his  title  when  a  mere  boy. 
Like  some  other  gallant  noblemen  of  the  time,  he 
lamented  and  opposed  the  tyrannical  innovations  of 
the  crown  upon  the  rights  of  the  people,  but  he  stood 
by  the  King  at  Edgehill  and  at  Oxford,  earnestly 
striving  for  j)eace,  for  as  Clarendon  said  of  him,  ''no 
man  had  more  melancholy  apprehensions  of  the  issue 
of  the  war." 

Subsequently,  when  these  apprehensions  were  real- 
ized and  the  king  was  imprisoned,  Lord  Southampton 
made  the  most  strenuous  efforts  for  his  deliverance, 
and,  finally,  after  Charles  was  beheaded,  he  was  one  of 
the  four  faithful  servants  who  obtained  permission  to 


432  THE   WIFE  OF   LORD   WILLIAM   RUSSELL. 

pay  the  last  duty  to  his  remains,  though  without  any 
regal  ceremonial.  Yet  the  two  sons  of  the  monarch  he 
had  served  so  faithfully,  the  dissolute  and  unprincipled 
Charles  the  Second  and  the  malignant  ahd  bigoted 
James  the  Second,  were  to  be  the  heartless  instruments 
of  robbing  his  daughter  of  her  husband  and  her  chil- 
dren of  a  father's  care.  Insincerity,  inveracity,  ingrat- 
itude were  the  triune  characteristics  of  the  Stuart 
kings,  especially  of  the  last  two  of  them.  Charles  the 
Second  and  his  brother,  then  Duke  of  York,  had  pre- 
arranged the  death  of  Lord  William  Russell.  Years 
afterward,  when  James,  then  king,  was  in  desiderate 
straits,  he  met  their  victim's  father,  the  Earl  of  Bedford, 
and  cringingly  begged  his  assistance.  "  My  lord,"  he 
cried,  "  you  are  a  good  man  ;  you  have  much  interest 
with  the  peers  ;  you  can  do  me  great  service  with  them 
to-day."  "  I  am  old  and  feeble,"  replied  the  bereaved 
father,  with  dignity  and  significant  emphasis,  "but 
once  I  had  a  son  who  could  have  ser\7ed  your  majesty 
on  this  occasion." 

The  son  of  the  Earl  of  Bedford  saw  and  loved  the 
daughter  of  the  Earl  of  Southampton.  Her  guihood 
was  passed,  she  was  thirty-three  years  of  age,  three 
years  older  than  himself  and  a  widow,  though  child- 
less, when  he  married  her,  after  a  long  courtship,  in 
1669.  For  fourteen  years  they  lived  together  in  a  love 
and  harmony  that  was  indeed  sacramental  in  its  vii'tue. 
Her  only  child  by  her  first  husband,  Lord  Vaughan, 
had  died  in  infancy  ;  her  father  as  well  as  her  husband 
had  also  died,  and  she  and  her  sister,  Lady  Noel,  were 
coheiresses  to  the  paternal  estates,  the  latter,  as  the 
elder,  taking  the  family  seat  at  Lichfield,  while  Lady 


MADAME  RUSSELL. 


HER   SECOND   MARRIAGE.  425 

Yanglian  became  the  mistress  of  Stratton,  also  ^"n 
Hampshire.  There  she  lived  in  elegant  retirement,  for 
her  pure  and  refined  nature  shrank  from  contact  with 
the  foreign  and  domestic  profligacy  of .  the  court  of 
Charles  the  Second.  After  her  second  marriage,  her 
home  at  Stratton  was  the  favorite  residence  of  Lord 
Riissell  and  herself,  although  during  the  sittings  of 
Parliament  she  generally  accompanied  him  to  London. 
Sometimes  he  had  occasion  to  visit  his  father,  the  old 
earl,  at  Woburn,  still  the  seat  of  the  Dukes  of  Bedford. 
But  business  never  estranged  his  heart  from  her  he 
loved,  and  many  beautiful  letters  that  passed  between 
them  during  his  temporary  absence  attest  the  strength 
of  their  attachment.  His  wife  lived  for  him  and  for 
those  children  whom  she  bore  him — two  daughters  and 
a  son.  Her  letters  constantly  refer  to  them,  their 
health,  their  mental  i3rogress,  and  their  innocent  play. 
We  find  the  first  little  girl  adding  postscripts  to 
mamma's  letters  and  sending  messages  to  papa. 

Lord  Russell  was  one  of  those  who  maintained  the 
rights  of  the  Commons  against  the  encroachments  of 
the  crown — for  Charles  the  Second,  like  his  father,  at 
once  feared  and  hated  the  Parliament — and  w^ho  voted 
to  exclude  the  Duke  of  York,  as  a  Papist,  from  suc- 
ceeding to  the  throne.  As  the  king  had  to  take  an  oath 
to  preserve  the  liberties  and  religion  of  the  Church  of 
England,  which  a  Roman  Catholic  could  not  conscien- 
tiously do,  this  vote  of  exclusion  was  neither  unjust 
nor  unreasonable.  By  the  laws  of  England  to-day  the 
sovereign  must  be  a  Protestant.  But  of  course  it 
evoked  the  fury  of  the  Duke  of  York,  who  was  com- 
pletely under  Jesuit  influence,  and  his  brother,  who 


iZQ  THE   WIFE   OF   LORD    WILLIAM   RUSSELL. 

oied  a  Roman  Catholic,  and  while  he  lived  was  of  that 
religion,  so  far  as  he  believed  in  any. 

One  of  the  charges  brought  against  Lord  Russell  was 
that  he  had.  engaged  in  a  treasonable  correspondence 
with  France,  certain  interviews  with  M.  de  Rouvigny, 
son  of  the  former  French  Ambassador  to  England, 
being  so  misrepresented.  But  M.  de  Rouvigny  was 
Lady  Russell's  cousin,  and  as  the  two  families  had 
always  been  of  one  mind  in  the  Protestant  religion  as 
well  as  in  friendship,  their  frequent  intercourse  is 
easily  accounted  for. 

A  conspiracy  was  entered  into  by  the  court  and  the 
Roman  Catholic  party  to  destroy  Lord  Russell.  For 
this  purpose  witnesses  were  suborned,  of  one  of  whom, 
Lord  Howard,  Charles  the  Second  himself  remarked 
long  afterward  that  he  could  not  hang  a  dog  upon  his 
testimony.  Early  in  the  summer  of  1683,  Josiah  Keel- 
ing, a  vintner  in  poor  circumstances,  gave  information 
of  a  plot  that  he  said  existed  to  raise  an  insurrection 
and  to  assassinate  the  king  and  the  Duke  of  York,  on 
their  return  from  Newmarket,  at  a  farmhouse  called 
Rye,  from  which  the  conspu-acy,  real  or  supj^osed,  is 
known  as  the  Rye  House  Plot.  Several  persons  were 
apprehended  ;  among  them  two  men  named  Pumsey 
and  West,  who,  to  save  themselves,  made  a  confession 
which,  Burnet  says,  was  merely  a  concerted  story. 
Friends  of  Lord  Russell  apprised  him  of  his  danger, 
but  though  he  might  easily  have  fled,  he  refused  to 
leave  home  or  to  do  anything  that  would  seem  like  an 
acknowledgment  of  guilt.  On  the  26th  of  June,  a 
messenger  was  sent  to  take  him  before  the  Council, 
where  he  was  examined  in  the  presence  of  the  king. 


LORD   RUSSELL   IN   PRISON.  437 

Charles  preferred  not  to  suspect  him  of  designs  against 
his  person,  but  said  that  he  believed  him  guilty  of  con- 
spiracy against  the  government.  When  the  exami- 
nation was  over,  Lord  Russell  was  committed  a  close 
prisoner  to  the  Tower  on  an  accusation  of  high  treason, 
though  his  most  vindictive  enemies  seemed  to  have 
acquitted  him  of  plotting  against  the  life  of  the  king 
and  the  duke. 

From  the  hour  of  his  arrest  Lord  Russell  saw  that 
he  was  prejudged  and  doomed.  His  wife,  who  shared 
his  inmost  thoughts,  felt  the  same  forebodings,  and  pre- 
pared to  stand  by  him  as  only  such  a  woman  can.  She 
nerved  herself  for  the  terrible  ordeal  she  was  to  undergo, 
and  wasted  no  time  and  strength  in  ''  woman's  tears." 
The  interval  between  the  arrest  and  the  trial  she  spent 
in  collecting  evidence  for  his  defence.  She  writes 
briefly  to  him,  "  I  had,  at  coming  home,  an  account 
that  your  trial,  as  to  your  appearing,  is  not  till  to- 
morrow. Others  are  tried  this  day,  and  your  indict- 
ment presented,  I  suppose.  I  am  going  to  your 
counsel,  when  you  shall  have  a  further  account  from 

.''     She  omitted  her  name,  for  fear  of  interception 

of  the  letter.  Another  short  note  asks  his  leave  to  be 
at  his  trial  and  reads  :  "  Your  friends  believing  I  can 
do  you  some  service  at  your  trial,  I  am  extremely  will- 
ing to  try  ;  my  resolution  will  hold  out,  pray  let  yours. 
But  it  may  be  the  court  will  not  let  me  ;  however,  do 
you  let  me  try.*' 

On  Friday,  the  thirteenth  day  of  July,  1683,  Lord 
William  Russell  was  placed  at  the  bar  of  the  old  Bailey 
on  trial  for  high  treason  ;  the  substance  of  the  indict- 
ment being  for  "  conspiring  the  death  of  the  king  and 


438  THE   WIFE   OF   LORD   WILLIAM  RUSSELL. 

consulting  and  agreeing  to  stir  up  insurrection  ;  and 
to  tliat  end  to  seize  the  guards  appointed  for  the  pres- 
ervation of  the  king's  person."  Lord  Russell  pleaded 
"Not  guilty,"  and  demurred  at  the  selection  of  the 
jury,  beseeching  that  his  trial  might  be  delayed  a  few- 
hours,  so  that  he  might  examine  the  list  of  their  names. 
He  was  told  that  if  he  challenged  any  of  the  jurors,  he 
must  do  so  before  they  were  sworn.  All  delay  was 
refused  him,  and  he  had  therefore  no  opportunity  for 
inquiry  about  them.  He  subsequently  asked  if  he 
might  be  allowed  the  use  of  pen,  ink,  and  paper,  and 
the  use  of  papers  that  he  had,  which  being  granted,  he 
asked  further,  "if  he  might  have  somebody  to  write, 
to  help  his  memory."  The  Attorney-General  consent- 
ing, the  Lord  Chief  Justice,  Sir  Francis  Pemberton, 
told  him,  "  Yes,  a  servant,  or  any  of  your  servants, 
shall  assist  you."  "  My  wife,"  said  the  prisoner,  "  is 
here  to  do  it. " 

Upon  this  it  is  recorded  that  Lady  Russell  arose  in 
court,  calm  and  dignified,  to  assist  her  husband,  and 
that  as  she  did  so  a  thrill  of  sympathy  swept  through 
the  assembly.  Few  could  look  upon  the  daughter  of 
"  the  virtuous  Southampton,"  who  had  been  so  faith- 
ful to  the  father  of  the  king  who  now  sought  to  shed 
the  innocent  blood  of  her  husband,  without  a  senti- 
ment of  respect  and  pity.  Even  the  Lord  Chief  Justice 
deprecated  her  giving  herself  the  trouble.  Her  noble 
bearing,  her  fortitude,  and  her  affection  must  have 
been  the  one  drop  of  consolation  in  the  bitter  cup  of 
her  husband's  affliction.  The  infamous  Jeffreys,  then 
sergeant-at-law,  made  one  of  his  atrocious  speeches 
against  him.      The  foresworn  witnesses  testified,  and 


CONDEMNATION  OF  RUSSELL.  439 

the  picked  jury  fennel  a  verdict  of  gnilty,  and  sentence 
of  death  was  pronounced. 

From  the  moment  of  her  husband's  condemnation, 
Lady  Russell  was  unremitting  in  her  efforts  to  obtain 
a  commutation  of  the  sentence.  She  drew  up  a  peti- 
tion, praying  for  six  weeks'  reprieve,  that  evidence  of 
his  innocence  might  be  collected  ;  she  even  threw  her- 
self at  the  feet  of  the  king  and  craved  his  clemency. 
But  mercy  had  no  place  in  that  insensate,  though  sen- 
sual nature.  He  could  not  have  forgotten  the  tender 
ministry  of  her  father  to  his  father's  body  ;  he  could 
not  have  forgotten  Lord  Southampton's  fealty  to  the 
House  of  Stuart,  his  preference  of  obscurity  to  Crom- 
well's overtures,  and  his  deep  services  to  himself  in 
bygone  days.  He  desired  her  husband's  death,  and 
showed  himself  an  utter  ingrate  to  her  father. 

The  trial  had  taken  place  on  the  13th  of  July  ;  the 
execution  was  fixed  for  the  21st.  No  time  was  to  be 
lost.  The  Earl  of  Bedford  would  have  given  all  he 
had  to  save  his  much-loved  son.  He  offered,  it  is  said, 
one  hundred  thousand  pounds  to  the  Duchess  of 
Portsmouth,  Louise  de  Queroualles,  the  king's  most 
powerful  mistress,  to  obtain  his  pardon.  The  Rou- 
vignys  bestirred  themselves  for  their  cousin  Lady  Rus- 
sell' s  sake,  as  well  as  for  his  own.  At  their  entreatv 
the  French  King  Louis  XIV.  wrote  a  letter  to  Charles 
on  his  behalf  which  M.  de  Rouvigny  was  to  carry  to 
England.  With  cynical  indifference  Charles  only  said  : 
"  I  do  not  wish  to  prevent  M.  de  Rouvigny  from  com- 
ing here,  but  my  Lord  Russell's  head  will  be  off  before 
he  arrives."  The  condemned  man  wrote  himself  for 
mercy,  but  with  dignity,  denying  his  guilt,  both  to  the 


430  THE  WIFE  OF  LORD   WILLIAM  RUSSELL. 

king  and  the  Duke  of  York  ;  but  in  vain.  Charles 
afterward  said  that  he  might  have  spared  his  life  but 
for  his  brother.  Lord  Russell's  execution  produced 
quite  a  different  effect  upon  the  people  of  England  to 
that  which  these  royal  murderers  anticipated,  and  was 
one  of  the  undying  memories  that  brought  the  more 
cruel  of  them  to  his  fall.  Nations  have  memories  as 
well  as  individuals,  and  the  memory  of  the  English 
people  for  their  wrong  is  a  long  and  patient  one. 

Dr.  Burnet,  the  historian  of  his  own  times,  after- 
ward Bishop  of  Salisbury,  and  Dr.  Tillotson,  afterward 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  in  their  eagerness  to  save 
their  friend,  begged  him  to  make  some  confession  as  a 
last  resource.  He  refused,  nobly,  to  save  his  life  by 
falsehood.  He  maintained  that  resistance  to  oppres- 
sion was  sometimes  a  duty,  and  that  if  a  nation  waited 
till  its  liberties  were  gone,  resistance  would  be  too  late. 

All  was  in  vain.  The  day  before  his  execution  Lord 
Russell  took  leave  of  his  children,  but  afterward  his 
wife  returned  to  him  alone.  When  supper- time  was 
near  he  said  to  her,  "  Stay  and  sup  with  me  ;  let  us 
eat  our  last  meal  on  earth  together  ;"  and  as  they  sat 
at  table  he  talked  cheerfully,  especially  of  his  daughters 
and  of  the  state  of  his  own  mind  at  the  close  approach 
of  death.  Bishop  Burnet,  not  yet  a  bishop,  was  with 
him  constantly  ;  and  the  pathos  of  his  narrative  needs 
no  extension  : 

"At  ten  o'clock  my  lady  left  me.  He  Idssed  her 
four  or  five  times,  and  she  kept  her  sorrow  so  within 
herself  that  she  gave  him  no  disturbance  by  their  part- 
ing. After  she  was  gone  he  said,  '  Now  the  bitterness 
of  death  is  past,'   and  ran  out  into  a  long  discourse 


A   HUSBAND'S   TRIBUTE.  431 

about  her,  how  great  a  blessing  she  had  been  to  him, 
and  said  what  a  misery  it  would  have  been  to  him  if 
she  had  not  had  that  magnanimity  of  spirit,  joined  to 
her  tenderness,  as  never  to  have  desired  him  to  do  a 
base  thing  for  the  saving  of  his  life  ;  whereas,  other- 
wise, what  a  week  should  I  have  passed  if  she  had 
been  crying  on  me  to  turn  informer  and  be  a  Lord 
Howard.  Though  he  then  repeated  what  he  had  often 
before  said,  that  he  knew  of  nothing  whereby  the  peace 
of  the  nation  was  in  danger,  and  that  all  that  ever  was 
either  loose  discourse,  or,  at  most,  embryos  that  never 
come  to  anything,  so  that  there  was  nothing  on  foot  to 
his  knowledge.  But  he  left  that  discourse,  and  returned 
to  speak  of  my  lady.  He  said  there  was  a  signal  prov- 
idence of  God  in  giving  him  such  a  wife,  where  there 
was  birth,  fortune,  great  understanding,  great  religion, 
and  great  kindness  to  him  ;  but  her  carriage  in  her 
extremity  was  beyond  all.  He  said  he  was  glad  that 
she  and  his  children  were  to  lose  nothing  by  his  death, 
and  it  was  a  great  comfort  to  him  that  he  left  his  chil- 
dren to  such  a  mother's  hands,  and  that  she  had  prom- 
ised to  take  care  of  herself  for  their  sakes,  which  I 
heard  her  do." 

Burnet  attended  him  to  the  scaffold.  Lord  Rus- 
sell's fortitude  and  resignation  did  not  desert  him,  for 
he  had  faith  in  God,  and  that  death  was  the  entrance 
to  a  better  life.  It  had  been  usual,  in  cases  of  high 
treason,  for  the  execution  to  take  place  on  Tower  Hill, 
but  the  government  foolishly  thinking  that  a  long  and 
dismal  procession  through  the  streets  would  intimidate 
the  citizens  of  London,  decided  that  Lord  William 
Russell  should  be  beheaded  in  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields. 


432  THE   WIFE   OF   LORD   WILLIAM   RUSSELL. 

Six  years  after  the  baneful  rule  of  the  Stuarts  came 
to  an  end,  and  Dr.  Gilbert  Burnet,  instead  of  standing 
on  the  scaffold  beside  a  patriot  and  a  martyr,  was 
chaplain  to  King  William  the  Third,  and  a  Lord  Bishox) 
of  the  Church  of  England.  He  relates  that  Lord  Rus- 
sell, who  rode  in  his  own  carriage  with  Burnet  beside 
him  to  the  place  of  execution,  looked  from  the  coach 
window  as  they  passed  his  own  house,  and  that  a  tear 
or  two  fell  from  his  eyes.  But  he  died,  as  he  had 
lived,  "without  fear  and  without  reproach."  It  is 
believed  that  the  tears  that  escaped  him  were  caused 
by  the  knowledge  that  his  wife  was  passing  her  hours 
of  agony  between  the  parting  and  the  execution  in  that 
very  home — Southampton  House. 

Detraction  followed  Lord  William  Russell  even  after 
his  death.  The  king's  friends  spread  a  report  that  the 
paper  he  delivered  to  the  sheriff  on  the  scaffold,  and 
which  contained  the  calm  expression  of  his  political 
sentiments,  was  not  his  own.  Upon  hearing  this.  Lady 
Russell  wrote  a  letter  to  the  king,  in  which  she  said  : 

" 'Tis  a  great- addition  to  my  sorrows  to  hear  your 
majesty  is  prevailed  upon  to  believe  that  the  paper  he- 
delivered  to  the  sheriff  at  his  death  was  not  his  own. 
I  can  truly  say,  and  am  ready  in  the  solemnest  manner 
to  attest,  that  I  often  heard  him  discourse  the  chiefest 
matters  contained  in  that  paper  in  the  same  expres- 
sions he  therein  uses,  as  some  of  those  few  relations 
that  were  admitted  to  him  can  likewise  aver.  ...  I 
do,  therefore,  humbly  beg  your  majesty  would  be  so 
charitable  to  believe  that  he,  who  in  all  his  life  was 
observed  to  act  with  the  greatest  clearness  and  sin- 
cerity, would  not  at  the  point  of  death  do  so  disingen- 


A  PROFLIGATE  MONARCH.  433 

uous  and  false  a  thing  as  to  deliver  for  his  own  what 
was  not  yjroperly  and  expressly  so.  And  if,  after  the 
loss  in  such  a  manner  of  the  best  husband  in  the  world, 
I  were  capable  of  any  consolation,  your  majesty  only 
could  afford  it  by  having  better  thoughts  of  him.  .  .  . 
I  hope  I  have  writ  nothing  in  this  that  will  offend  your 
majesty.  If  I  have,  I  humbly  beg  of  you  to  consider 
it  as  coming  from  a  woman  amazed  with  grief,  and  that 
you  will  pardon  the  daughter  of  a  person  who  served 
your  majesty's  father  in  his  greatest  extremities,  and 
one  that  is  not  conscious  of  having  ever  done  anything 
to  offend  you  before." 

The  petty  spite  and  malignity  that  sought  to  efface 
the  impression  which  Lord  Russell's  noble  presence 
had  made  at  the  trial  and  on  the  scaffold  by  inventing 
such  a  story,  ill  deserved  to  be  treated  with  so  much 
respect.  But  Lady  Rtissell,  however  little  she  could 
respect  the  profligate  monarch,  had  been  taught  from 
childhood  "  to  honor  the  king."  The  English  people 
of  our  own  times,  not  less  than  Americans,  may  well 
be  thankful  that  the  state  of  tyranny,  corruption,  and 
cruelty  which  made  the  judicial  murder  of  Lord 
William  Russell  possible  has  passed  away.  The  hearts 
of  wives  and  mothers  are  often  overwhelmed  with  sor- 
rows and  bereavements,  but  such  trials  as  Lady  Rus- 
sell went  through  are  no  longer  possible.  No  such 
mockery  of  law,  no  such  brutal  pleader  as  Jeffreys,  no 
such  lying  witnesses,  packed  juries,  and  unjust  sen- 
tences can  now  lay  axe  to  an  innocent  man's  head  or 
put  the  rope  around  his  neck. 

The  evening  of  Lady  Russell's  life  was  passed  in 
tranquillity  in  the  midst  of  the  children  who  reminded 


434  THE   WIFE   OF   LORD   WILLIAM   RUSSELL. 

her  of  ''  the  dear  companion  and  sharer  of  all  her  joys 
and  sorrows."  "  When  I  see  my  children  before  me," 
she  writes  to  a  friend  of  her  husband,  "  I  remember 
the  pleasure  he  took  in  them."  Grief,  however,  borne 
in  patience  and  in  silence,  had  left  its  marks.  The  care 
of  her  family  combined  with  the  excitement  of  the 
times  to  sustain  her.  Within  three  months  of  her 
return  to  London  Charles  the  Second  died  that  memo- 
rable death  so  finely  pictured  by  Macaulay,  and  her 
husband's  bitterest  enemy,  James  the  Second,  filled  the 
throne.  The  blood  of  her  husband  still  cried  from  the 
ground,  and  she  must  have  watched  with  faith,  though 
without  vindictiveness,  the  divine  vengeance  that  was 
soon  to  overtake  the  chief  of  his  murderers. 

The  clouds  jDarted  at  length  from  the  political  hori- 
zon. The  accession  of  William  and  Mary — his  own 
daughters  were  the  appointed  instruments  of  retribu- 
tive justice  to  James  the  Second — reversed  the  attainder 
of  her  husband  and  made  it  a  posthumous  eulogy,  and 
restored  his  children  to  more  than  their  ancestral  titles. 
Already  the  Prince  and  Princess  of  Orange  had  sent 
messages  of  condolence  to  Lady  Russell,  and  the  prin- 
cess had  written  to  her  in  most  affectionate  terms. 
Before  the  princess  reached  London  Lady  Russell 
wrote  to  the  ever-faithful  Gilbert  Burnet,  who  was  in 
his  train  as  chaplain,  to  express  her  joy  at  his  coming 
to  deliver  England,  and  her  eagerness  to  pay  homage 
to  the  king  and  queen.  The  principle  for  which  her 
husband  died  had  placed  the  crown  upon  their  heads, 
and  she  lived  to  see  it  grace  also  the  brow  of  good 
Queen  Anne,  "  at  whose  coronation  her  only  son,  who 
had  succeeded  to  the  title  of  Duke  of  Bedford  and  his 


AT   THE   AGE   OF   SEVENTY-FIVE.  435 

paternal  grandfather's  vast  estates,  officiated  as  Lord 
High  Constable  of  England  and  was  made  one  of  her 
majesty's  Privy  Council." 

Lady  Russell  had  also  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  both 
her  daughters  advantageously  and  happily  married, 
one  to  the  Duke  of  Rutland,  the  other  to  the  Duke  of 
D.evonshire.  But  in  her  seventy-fifth  year  the  horizon 
of  her  happiness  was  again  heavily  clouded.  Her  son, 
the  Duke  of  Bedford,  Lord  High  Constable  of  England 
and  Privy  Counsellor,  died  of  the  small-pox  in  May, 
1711.  On  the  31st  of  October  in  the  same  year  her 
daughter,  the  Duchess  of  Rutland,  died  in  giving  birth 
to  her  ninth  child,  and  her  only  remaining  child, 
Catharine,  Duchess  of  Devonshire,  who  had  also 
recently  become  a  mother,  died  also.  The  old  noble- 
woman preserved  her  equanimity,  and  in  answer  to 
inquiry  said  she  had  that  day  seen  her  invalid 
daughter  Catharine  out  of  bed.  She  had  indeed  looked 
upon  her  in  her  coffin. 

For  twelve  years  longer  the  tide  of  her  own  life  did 
not  ebb,  and  it  was  forty  years  after  the  execution  of 
her  husband  that  Lady  Rachel  Russell  passed  away  at 
Southami^ton  House,  amid  the  memories  and  scenes  of 
her  childhood  and  of  her  married  and  widowed  life,  in 
1723,  on  the  29th  of  September,  the  anniversary  of  her 
husband's  birthday,  a  day  often  mentioned  in  her  early 
letters  as  one  of  festivity  and  rejoicing. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  LAMARTINE. 

Aix  DES  Roys,  or  Alice  de  Roy,  as  her  name  is  also 
written,  was  the  daughter  of  the  intendant-general  of  the 
Duke  of  Orleans,  and  was  brought  up  in  the  atmos- 
phere of  a  court.  She  married  a  royalist,  and  was  con- 
sequently exposed  to  much  suspicion  and  danger  dur- 
ing the  bitter  days  of  the  Revolution.  It  was  her 
custom  to  record  every  evening  the  experiences  of  the 
day  as  well  as  her  own  reflections,  and  the  diary  thus 
completed  made  a  number  of  small  volumes  which  were 
preserved  by  her  son  and  the  main  j^roofs  of  which 
were  published  by  him  after  her  death,  under  the  title 
of  "  Le  Manuscrit  de  ma  Mere,  avec  Prologue,  Com- 
mentaires,  et  Epilogue."  This  book,  translated  into 
English  by  Lady  Herbert,  of  Lea,  and  independently 
about  the  same  time  by  Maria  Louisa  Helper,  of  Ashe- 
ville,  IN^orth  Carolina,  gives  us  a  clear  idea  of  a  most 
excellent  and  amiable  mother,  who  writes  on  June 
11th,  1801 :  "  I  have  still  five  children  after  losing  one  ; 
four  daughters  and  a  boy  named  Alphonse.  He  is  a 
good  and  dutiful  child.  May  God  make  him  pious, 
wise,  Christian — this  is  what  I  most  earnestly  desire 
for  him." 

"  This  habit  of  registering  her  soul,"  says  Lamartine 
in  his  Confessions,  "  a  habit  which  she  observed  to 
her  dying  day,  produced  from  fifteen  to  twenty  volumes 
of  intimate  communion  between  herself  and  God,  which 


HER   FAVORITE   BOOKS.  437 

I  have  been  fortunate  enough  to  keep,  and  in  which  I 
find  her  again,  all  alive  and  loving,  when  I  feel  the 
want  of  taking  refuge  once  more  in  her  bosom." 

The  two  books  which  Madame  Lamartine  studied 
unceasingly  and  in  which  she  tried  to  interest  her  son 
were  the  "  Confessions"  of  St,  Augustine  and  the 
"  Genius  of  Christianity"  of  Chauteaubriand,  both  of 
whom  had  been  reclaimed  from  the  errors  of  their  ways 
by  pious  mothers.     She  writes  : 

"  October  2d,  1802. — I  had  brought  with  me  the  '  Con- 
fessions '  of  St,  Augustine,  It  is  a  book  to  which  I 
take  very  much,  and  this  morning  I  saw  with  pleasure 
that  Alphonse  had  opened  and  was  reading  it  with 
interest." 

"  December  17th,  1802. — I  am  constantly  reading  the 
'  Confessions '  of  St,  Augustine.  It  is  quite  apropos. 
I  wish  to  imitate  St.  Monica  so  far  as  in  me  lies,  and 
by  her  example  I  pray,  and  pray  unceasingly,  for  my 
children." 

In  Lamartine' s  "  Memoirs  of  my  Youth"  he  teUs  us 
that  his  maternal  grandmother  occupied  the  position 
of  under-governess  to  the  children  of  the  Duke  of 
Orleans,  to  whom  her  husband  was  superintendent  of 
finance,  and  that  she  was  a  great  favorite  with  the 
lovely  and  virtuous  Duchess  of  Orleans,  whom  the 
Revolution  respected,  even  while  driving  her  from  her 
jjalace,  banishing  her  sons  into  exile,  and  leading  her 
husband  to  the  scaffold.  Monsieur  and  Madame  des 
Roys  had  apartments  in  the  Palais  Royal  in  winter, 
and  at  St.  Cloud  in  summer.  His  mother  was  born  at 
St.  Cloud,  and  was  brought  up  there  along  with  Louis 
Philippe,  in  that  respectful  familiarity  which  always 


438  THE   MOTHER   OF    LAMARTINE. 

springs  up  between  children  of  the  same  age,  sharing 
the  same  lessons  and  the  same  sports. 

Often  did  Madame  Lamartine  relate  to  her  childi^en 
anecdotes  connected  with  the  education  of  this  prince, 
whom  one  revolution  drove  from  his  native  land  while 
another  raised  him  to  the  throne  of  France.  "  There 
is  not  a  single  fountain,  alley,  or  velvet  lawn  of  the 
gardens  of  St.  Cloud,''  says  Lamartine,  ""  which  we  did 
not  know  intimately  from  the  recollections  of  her 
childhood,  before  we  had  ever  seen  them  ourselves. 
St.  Cloud  was  to  her  her  Milly,  her  cradle,  the  spot 
where  all  her  earliest  thoughts  had  taken  root,  had 
blossomed,  had  grown  and  increased,  along  with  the 
trees  and  plants  of  that  lovely  park.  All  the  high- 
sounding  names  of  the  eighteenth  century  were  the 
first  that  were  engraven  on  her  memory.  At  the  age 
of  seven  or  eight,  she  was  present  at  a  visit  which 
Voltaire  paid  to  her  parents,  and  the  society  of  her 
mother,  Madame  des  Roys,  was  frequented  by  D'Alem- 
bert,  Laclos,  Madame  de  Genlis,  Buffon  the  naturalist, 
Florian,  Gibbon  the  historian,  Grimm,  Movellet,  Mon- 
sieur Xecker,  and  other  great  men  of  the  time.  She 
was  particularly  intimate  with  Jean  Jacques  Rous- 
seau, although  as  a  strict  Roman  Catholic  she  did 
not  sympathize  with  his  religious  opinions." 

The  marriage  of  Lamartine's  mother  had  an  element 
of  romance  in  it  which  accorded  well  with  her  imagina- 
tive character.  One  of  his  father's  sisters  was  canoness 
of  one  of  the  noble  chapters  which  existed  at  that  time 
in  France,  and  which  combined  the  best  features  of  the 
religious  and  the  worldly  life.  In  a  beautiful  spot, 
not  far  from  some  large  toAvn,    whose   neighborhood 


UNDER  GENTLE  SURVEILLANCE.         439 

diffused  life  and  information  through  these  convents 
without  walls,  wealthy  and  noble  families,  after  having 
made  what  was  called  their  proofs,  sent  such  of  their 
daughters  to  reside  as  did  not  feel  an  inclination  for 
the  profession  of  cloistered  nuns,  but  who  had  not 
dowry  sufficient  to  make  eligible  marriages.  Each  one 
received  a  small  portion.  A  handsome  house  was 
erected  for  them  on  a  uniform  plan,  situated  in  a  little 
garden,  and  forming  one  of  a  group  clustered  around 
the  chapel  of  the  chapter.  The  usual  age  for  entering 
these  chapters  was  from  fourteen  or  fifteen.  The 
novices  began  by  being  placed  under  the  easy  and 
gentle  surveillance  of  the  eldest  of  the  canonesses,  who 
had  taken  the  vows  and  to  whose  care  their  families 
confided  them  ;  subsequently,  when  they  had  attained 
the  age  of  twenty,  they  assumed  the  direction  of  their 
household  themselves  ;  they  formed  an  association 
with  one  or  two  of  their  friends,  and  lived  in  common 
in  groups  of  tw^o  or  three. 

It  was  only  during  the  summer  and  autumn  months 
that  these  noble  novices  resided  in  their  free  convents. 
In  winter  thev  returned  home  to  their  relatives  in  the 
neighboring  towns,  to  spend  a  pleasant  holiday  and 
shine  as  the  ornaments  of  their  mother's  salons.  While 
residing  at  the  chapter  they  were  subject  to  no  re- 
straint, save  that  of  repairing  twice  each  day  to  the 
chapel  to  chant  the  service  of  the  Church  ;  and  even 
from  that  duty  it  was  easy  to  get  excused  when  they 
wished.  In  the  evening,  they  met  together,  sometimes 
at  the  house  of  the  abbess,  sometimes  at  the  residence 
of  one  of  their  own  number,  to  play  games,  to  chat,  to 
read,  without  any  other  rule  than  their  own  tastes,  and 


440  THE   MOTHER   OF   LAMARTIXE. 

without  any  surveillance  except  that  of  an  aged  canon- 
ess,  the  indulgent  guardian  of  the  charming  flock. 
There  were  only  two  rules,  that  of  returning  home  at  a 
certain  hour,  and  another  which  excluded  the  male  sex 
from  their  reunions.  Exceptions  sometimes  prove  the 
rule,  and  such  was  the  case  as  to  the  exclusion  of 
gentlemen  from  the  society  of  the  chapter.  The  young 
canonesses  might  receive  their  brothers  on  a  visit 
during  a  certain  number  of  days,  and  might  present 
them  to  theu'  friends  at  the  social  meetings  of  this 
delightful  sisterhood.  The  result  need  scarcely  be 
told.  Love  affairs  sprang  up  between  the  vivacious 
recluses  and  the  young  officers  who  came  to  spend  a 
few  days  of  furlough  with  their  sisters.  There  were 
whisi^erings  together,  tender  partings,  prearranged  cor- 
resjDondence,  and  sometimes  an  elopement.  Many 
marriages  of  affection,  at  that  period  so  rare  in  French 
society,  resulted  from  these  introductions,  and  the 
love-match  on  both  sides  of  Lamartine's  parents  was 
one  such  instance. 

His  aunt's  chapter  was  situated  on  the  banks  of  the 
Saone,  between  Lyons  and  Macon.  At  the  age  of  six- 
teen a  charming  girl  joined  the  chapter  and  resided  in 
her  house,  which  her  father,  a  veteran  of  the  reigns  of 
Louis  XIV.  and  XV.,  who  had  received  the  cross  of 
St.  Louis,  then  the  great  object  of  a  provincial  gentle- 
man's ambition,  had  built  for  his  daughter,  when  she 
took  the  vows  and  became  a  canoness  at  the  age  of 
twenty-one.  The  old  soldier's  son,  Lamartine's  father, 
when  paying  a  visit  to  Salles,  as  the  village  was  called, 
was  struck  with  the  charms  of  mind,  heart,  and  person 
of  the  young  novice,  Aix  des  Roys,  who  had  been 


THE  MOTHER  OF   LAMARTINE. 


THE   FRENCH   RESOLUTION.  443 

appointed  a  canoness  by  the  Duke  of  Orleans,  There 
were  many  obstacles  of  family  and  fortune  in  the  way 
of  their  marrying,  but  they  overcame  them  all.  They 
were  united  in  wedlock  at  the  very  moment  when  the 
Revolution  was  beginning  to  threaten  all  social,  polit- 
ical, and  religious  institutions,  and  was  undermining 
all  the  privileges  and  prejudices  of  the  ancient  order  of 
society  in  France.  "My  father,"  says  Lamartine, 
"  had  not  quitted  the  service  on  his  marriage  ;  he  saw 
in  all  this  nothing  but  his  colors  to  be  follow^ed,  the 
king  to  be  defended,  a  few  months'  struggle  against 
disorder,  a  few  drops  of  his  blood  shed  in  the  execu- 
tion of  his  duty.  These  first  lightning  Hashes  of  a 
tempest  which  was  destined  to  overwhelm  a  throne, 
and  shake  all  Europe  for  half  a  century  at  least,  were 
lost  upon  my  mother  and  himself  in  the  first  raptures 
of  their  love,  and  the  first  dawning  perspective  of  their 
happiness. " 

It  is  a  true  remark  of  Lamartine' s  that  those  are 
grossly  mistaken  as  to  the  origin  of  the  French  Revo- 
lution who  imagine  that  it  was  propagated  from  below 
and  sprung  from  the  common  people.  It  was  the 
noblesse,  the  clergy,  the  thinking  part  of  the  com- 
munity, people  of  ideas,  who  brought  about  the  Revo- 
lution of  '89,  His  grandfather,  his  father,  and  his 
uncles  did  not  oppose  the  princij^les  of  that  movement. 
It  was  only  when  it  became  demagogic  instead  of 
democratic,  and  was  turned  against  those  who  origi- 
nated it,  and  became  an  orgy  of  blood,  spoliation,  and 
torture,  that  his  father  braved  its  fury  and  became  its 
victim.  Scarcely  had  he  married  his  beautiful  and 
spiritueUe  young  wife  when  the  palace  of  the  Tuileries 


444  THE   MOTHER  OF   LAMAllTIXE. 

and  the  life  of  tlie  king  were  threatened,  and  the 
Constitution  of  '91,  a  temporary  pact  of  conciliation  be- 
tween re23resentative  royalty  and  the  sovereign  people, 
was  to  be  overturned  amid  seas  of  blood.  The  elder 
Lamartine  was  among  the  true  men  who  rallied  around 
Louis  XYI.  The  hapjDy  couple  were  forced  to  separate, 
and  Madame  de  Lamartine,  with  the  baby  Alphonse  at 
her  bosom,  bade  farewell  Mdthout  a  murmur  to  her 
husband.  "  She  could  not  understand  life  without 
honor,"  says  her  son,  "and  never  hesitated  between 
suffering  and  duty.'.'  A  noble  tribute  surely  to  a 
mother  from  a  son. 

It  is  far  easier  to  imagine  than  to  describe  the  life  of 
constant  uncertainty,  anxiety,  and  foreboding  which 
the  wife  of  a  suspect  must  have  exj)erienced  during 
"  the  Reign  of  Terror.''  One  night  the  populace  tore 
from  their  dwelling  Lamartine's  grandfather,  who  was 
eighty-four  years  of  age,  his  grandmother,  almost 
equally  aged  and  infirm,  his  two  uncles,  and  his  three 
aunts,  who  were  nuns,  who  had  already  been  driven 
from  theu'  convents.  The  whole  family  Avere  thrown 
pell-mell  into  a  cart,  escorted  by  gens  d'armes,  and 
conducted  amid  hootings  and  shoutings  to  prison  at 
Autun.  An  exception  for  some  unknown  reason  was 
made  in  the  disposal  of  Lamartine's  father,  who  was 
imprisoned  at  Macon.  His  prison  contained  about  two 
hundred  persons  accused  of  no  crime,  but  arrested  on 
suspicion  of  loyalty  to  the  crown.  By  a  providential 
accident  the  prison  chanced  to  be  the  convent  of  the 
Ursulines,  familiar  to  him  from  a  child,  because  one  of 
his  aunts  had  been  its  abbess.  He  had  been  accus- 
tomed to  play  there,  and  knew  every  nook  and  corner 


FROM    PRISON    TO   HOME.  445 

of  the  place.  By  another  happy  accident  his  jailer 
had  been  a  cuirassier  in  his  own  company,  and  wept 
when  he  saw  his  old  captain  delivered  to  his  charge. 
He  readily  granted  the  prisoner's  request  to  be  lodged 
in  a  corner  of  the  garret,  from  which  he  could  see  his 
father's  residence.  His  wife,  then  nursing  the  great 
author  of  the  future,  was  left  alone  there,  and  a  like 
motive  prompted  her  to  frequent  those  chambers,  and 
especially  the  garret  which  looked  upon  the  prison. 
They  looked  upon  each  other  daily  and  were  com- 
forted. The  street  which  separated  the  two  buildings 
was  very  narrow.  Love  and  courage  inspired  the 
prisoner  with  the  thought,  not  of  escape,  but  of  reach- 
ing her.  His  wife  tremblingly  consented,  and  by  means 
of  an  arrow  and  some  thread  passed  a  file  to  her  hus- 
band. One  of  the  bars  of  his  little  window  was  soon 
filed  through  and  restored  to  its  place  ;  then,  one  even- 
ing, when  there  was  no  moonlight,  a  stout  cord  was 
passed  to  her  husband's  hand.  Firmly  fastened  on 
one  side  to  a  beam  in  the  garret  of  his  father's  house, 
he  tied  it  on  the  opposite  side  to  one  of  the  bars  of  his 
grated  window.  Then,  clinging  to  it  by  his  hands  and 
feet,  and  sliding  himself  along  from  knot  to  knot  above 
the  heads  of  the  sentinels,  he  crossed  the  street,  and 
found  himself  in  the  arms  of  his  wife  and  beside  the 
cradle  of  his  child.  He  did  not  dare  attempt  more 
than  a  few  hours'  absence  each  night,  but  this  consoled 
him  during  the  eighteen  months  that  elapsed  before  he 
was  set  free. 

Lamartine's  father  had  retained  from  the  family 
estate  only  the  little  country  house  of  Milly.  With 
three  thousand  livres  of  income  and  this  bare,  dilapi- 


446  THE   MOTHER   OF   LAMARTINE. 

dated  house  he  tried  to  settle  down  in  rustic  peace  and 
obscurity,  with  his  devoted  wife  and  increasing  family. 
Though  bred  amid  the  splendors  of  a  French  court,  the 
wife  and  mother  cheerfully  adapted  herself  to  their 
changed  circumstances,  and  resigned  without  a  murmur 
the  apartments  and  gardens  of  a  princely  mansion  for 
the  bare  floors,  desolate  rooms,  and  mouldering  walls  of 
a  country  house  not  occupied  for  a  century.  "It  is 
very  small,"  she  said  to  her  son,  "but  it  is  large 
enough,  if  we  learn  to  adapt  our  desires  and  habits 
accordingly.  Happiness  is  in  ourselves  ;  we  shall  not 
increase  it  by  extending  the  boundaries  of  our  meadows 
or  our  vineyards.  Happiness  is  not  measured  by  acres 
as  land  is  ;  it  is  measured  by  resignation  of  heart ;  for 
God  has  willed  that  the  poor  should  have  an  equal 
share  with  the  rich,  in  order  that  neither  should  think 
of  asking  it  from  any  but  Himself." 

Lamartine  in  his  ' '  Memoirs' '  has  given  a  vivid  picture 
of  this  humble  home  at  Milly.  Our  space  forbids  our 
reproducing  it  in  full,  but  we  venture  to  quote  portions 
of  it  which  give  an  idea  of  the  whole  : 

"  It  is  night.  The  doors  of  the  little  house  of  Milly 
are  closed.  A  friendly  dog  utters,  from  time  to  time, 
a  bark  in  the  courtyard.  The  rain  of  autumn  dashes 
against  the  panes  of  the  windows.  The  apartment 
which  I  see  in  memory  is  large  but  almost  naked.  At 
the  farther  extremity  is  a  deep  recess  containing  a  bed. 
It  is  my  mother's  bed.  There  are  two  cradles  on 
wooden  chairs.  .  .  .  They  are  the  cradles  of  my 
youngest  sisters,  who  have  long  been  sound  asleep.  .  .  . 
In  a  corner  of  the  room  is  a  little  harpsichord,  with 
some  sheets  of  the  music  of  '  The  Village  Divine, '  by 


THE   HOME   OF   LAMARTINE.  44? 

J.  J.  Rousseau,  scattered  over  the  instrument ;  nearer 
the  fire  in  the  centre  of  the  apartment  there  is  a  little 
card-table,  with  a  green  cloth  all  spotted  with  ink- 
stains  ;  on  the  table  two  candles  diffuse  a  feeble  light 
and  cast  huge  shadows  on  the  whitewashed  walls. 

"  Opposite  the  fireplace,  his  elbow  resting  on  the 
table,  a  man  is  seated  holding  a  book  in  his  hand. 
His  figure  is  tall,  his  limbs  robust.  He  still  retains  all 
the  vigor  of  youth.  His  forehead  is  open,  his  eye 
blue,  and  his  smile,  at  once  firm  and  graceful,  displays 
to  view  a  row  of  teeth  like  pearl.  Some  remains  of  his 
original  costume,  his  hair  especially,  and  a  certain 
military  stiffness  of  attitude,  proclaim  the  retired 
officer.  If  any  doubts  are  entertained  on  this  head, 
they  are  speedily  dissipated  by  the  appearance  of  his 
sabre,  his  regulation  pistols,  his  helmet,  and  the  gilt 
plates  of  his  horse's  bridle,  which  shine  suspended  by 
a  nail  from  the  wall  at  the  extremity  of  a  little  cabinet 
which  opens  off  the  apartment.    This  man  is  our  father. 

"  On  a  couch  of  plaited  straw,  occupying  an  angle 
formed  by  the  fireplace  and  the  wall  of  the  recess,  is 
seated  a  woman  who  appears  still  young,  although  she 
is  already  bordering  on  her  thirty-fifth  year.  Her 
figure,  tall  also,  has  all  the  suppleness  and  all  the 
elegance  of  that  of  a  young  girl.  Her  features  are  so 
delicately  formed,  her  black  eyes  have  a  look  so  open 
and  penetrating,  her  transparent  skin  permits  the  blue 
veins  and  the  ever- changing  color,  called  up  by  the 
slightest  emotion,  to  be  so  clearly  visible  beneath  its 
snowy  surface  ;  her  jet-black  but  fine  and  glossy 
tresses  fall  in  such  waVy  folds  and  graceful  ringlets 
around  her  cheeks,  and  rest  upon  her  shoulders,  that 


448  THE  MOTHER  OF  LAMARTINE. 

it  is  impossible  to  say  whether  she  is  eighteen  or  thirty 
years  of  age.  No  one  could  wish  to  strike  off  from 
her  age  one  of  those  years  which  have  only  served  to 
perfect  her  physiognomy  and  ripen  her  beauty. 

"  This  beauty,  although  pure  in  every  feature  if  they 
are  examined  in  detail,  is  peculiarly  apparent  in  the 
ensemble  by  its  harmony,  its  grace,  and  above  all  by 
that  radiance  of  inward  tenderness,  that  true  beauty  of 
the  soul,  which  lights  up  the  body  from  within — a 
radiance  of  which  the  loveliest  face  is  but  the  outward 
reflection.  This  young  woman,  half  reclining  on  the 
cushions,  holds  a  little  girl  asleep  in  her  arms,  her 
head  resting  on  her  shoulder.  The  child  still  rolls 
between  its  fingers  one  of  the  long  black  ringlets  of  its 
mother's  tresses,  with  which  it  had  just  been  playing 
before  it  fell  asleep.  Another  little  girl,  rather  older, 
is  seated  on  a  stool  at  the  foot  of  the  sofa  ;  she  is 
leaning  her  fair  head  on  her  mother's  knees.  This 
young  woman  is  my  mother  ;  these  two  children  are 
my  two  eldest  sisters.  The  two  others  are  in  their 
respective  cradles." 

His  mother,  he  says  elsewhere,  displayed  little 
anxiety  about  what  is  generally  called  instruction. 
"  She  did  not  aspire  to  make  me  a  child  far  advanced 
for  my  age.  She  did  not  arouse  within  me  that  emula- 
tion which  is  only  the  jealousy  or  the  pride  of  children. 
She  did  not  compare  me  to  any  pereon.  She  neither 
exalted  nor  humiliated  me  by  any  dangerous  com- 
l^arisons.  She  thought,  and  justly,  that  once  my  in- 
tellectual strength  was  developed  by  age,  and  by  health 
of  body  and  of  mind,  I  should  learn  as  easily  as  others 
the  little  Greek  and  Latin,   and  figures,  of  which  is 


A  JUDICIOUS  PARENT.  449 

composed  that  empty  modicum  of  letters  which  is 
called  an  education.  What  she  wished  was  to  make 
me  a  happy  child,  with  a  healthy  mind  and  a  loving 
soul ;  a  creature  of  God  and  not  a  puppet  of  man." 

Although  an  earnest  Catholic  in  her  belief,  the 
religious  training  which  Madame  de  Lamartine  gave  her 
children  was  based  on  natural  piety  and  benevolence. 

"  The  only  lessons  of  religion  given  us  by  my  mother 
were  limited  to  her  being  herself  religious  before  us 
and  along  with  us.     The  unceasing  stream  of  love,  of 
adoration,  of  gratitude,  and  prayer  which  gushed  from 
her  heart  was  her  sole  and  natural  preaching.     Prayer 
— but  rapid,  lyric,  winged  prayer — was  associated  in 
our  minds  vdth  the  slightest  actions  of  the  day.     This 
invocation  was  so  naturally  associated  with  them,  that 
it  was  always  a  pleasure  and  a  recreation  for  us,  in- 
stead of  being  a  wearisome  obligation.     Our  life  was 
in  the  hands  of  this  Idnd  parent  a  perpetual  sursum 
cor  da.     She  elevated  her  thoughts  to  God  as  naturally 
as  the  iDlant  stretches  upward  to  the  air  and  the  light. 
Our  mother,  to  accomplish  this,  took  a  contrary  course 
from  that  generally  adopted.     Instead  of  enjoining  on 
us  an  annoying  devotion,  which  would  take  children 
from  their  sports  or  their  sleep,  to  force  them  to  pray 
to  God,  frequently  amid  their  repugnance  and  tears, 
she  made  these  short  invocations  a  sort  of  feast  of  the 
soul,  to  which  she  invited  us  with  smiles.     She  did  not 
mingle  prayer  \Nith  our  tears,  but  with  all  the  little 
hapj)y  events  which  occurred  to  us  during  the  day. 
Thus,  when  we  awakened  in  the  morning  in  our  little 
beds,  when  the  cheerful  morning  sun  shone  through 
our  windows,    when   \\\<^  birds    carolled  their  songs, 


450  THE   MOTHER   OF   LAMARTINE. 

perched  in  the  rose-bushes  or  in  their  cages,  when  the 
footsteps  of  the  servants  had  long  echoed  through  the 
house,  and  when  we  impatiently  awaited  her  coming 
to  rise,  she  mounted  the  stairs,  she  entered,  her 
features  radiant  with  kindness,  with  tenderness,  with 
joy  ;  she  embraced  us  in  our  beds  ;  she  assisted  us  to 
dress  ;  she  listened  to  the  joyous  little  chirping  which 
children,  whose  imagination  is  refreshed  by  the  night's 
repose,  carol  on  awakening,  like  a  nest  of  swallows 
beneath  the  eaves  at  the  ax)proach  of  their  mother. 
Then  she  said  to  us  :  '  To  whom  do  we  owe  this  happi- 
ness which  we  are  about  to  enjoy  together  ?  It  is  to 
God  ;  it  is  to  our  heavenly  Father  ;  without  Him  this 
lovely  sun  would  not  perhaps  have  risen  ;  these  trees 
would  have  lost  their  leaves  ;  these  gay  and  happy  birds 
would  have  died  of  hunger  and  cold  on  the  bare  ground  ; 
and  you,  my  poor  children,  would  have  had  neither 
bed,  nor  house,  nor  garden,  nor  mother  to  shelter  and 
nourish  you,  or  to  gladden  your  hearts  during  the 
season  of  life.  It  is  most  just,  therefore,  to  thank  Him 
for  all  that  He  gives  us  on  this  day,  and  to  pray  to 
Him  that  He  will  give  us  many  other  such  days.' 
Then  she  kneeled  down  beside  our  bed,  she  joined  our 
little  hands  together,  frequently  covering  them  with 
kisses  as  she  did  so,  and  repeated  slowly  and  in  an 
under-voice,  the  short  morning  prayer,  which  we  re- 
peated with  her  accent  and  in  her  words." 

Thus  wrote  the  son  of  the  mother.  Let  us  see  how 
wrote  the  mother  of  the  son.  In  September,  1806,  she 
goes  to  Macon,  which  was  his  birthplace,  to  meet  him 
on  his  return  from  college,  and  finds  him  taller  and 
stronger  than  she  expected.     ''  He  is,  moreover,"  says 


MOTHER   AND    SON.  451 

her  diary,  ''  an  excellent  child.  The  Jesuits,  his  mas- 
ters,  speak  highly  of  his  faculties  ;  he  returns  loaded 
with  prizes  and  crowns,  and  he  is,  despite  of  this,  very 
modest.  What  pleases  me  still  more  is  that  he  appears 
now  inclined  to  piety  !  May  God  bless  him  and  pre- 
serve for  him  these  precious  gifts,  which  are  alone 
capable  of  making  him  happy." 

Lamartine,  as  a  man,  was  not  remarkable  for  the 
quality  of  modesty,  and  perhaps  his  mother's  first  im- 
pressions deceived  her  on  this  point.  Indeed,  she  has 
occasion  to  modify  her  praise  of  him,  as  appears  by 
the  following  entry  : 

"  I  have  presented  Alphonse  to  all  the  family  with 
some  little  pride.  I  do  not  find  his  tone  as  gentle  as  I 
should  wish.  I  am  afraid  of  estranging  him  from  me, 
Avhoni  he  loves  so  much,  by  scolding  him  for  it ;  and, 
on  the  other  hand,  I  am  afraid  of  s]3oiling  him  by  too 
much  deference.  Mon  Dieu !  how  diflacult  it  is  to 
form  a  man  I" 

The  mother  also  describes  as  well  as  the  son  the  quiet 
routine  of  the  country  house  at  Milly. 

"  September,  1807. — I  enjoy  my  solitude.  I  am  alone 
at  Milly,  with  my  children  and  my  books.  My  society 
is  Madame  de  Sevigne.  I  have  taken  a  long  walk  this 
evening  on  the  mountain  of  Craz.  I  was  quite  alone  ; 
it  is  my  delight  to  wander  thus  alone  in  the  evening  at 
this  season  of  the  year.  I  like  the  autumn,  and  the 
walks  without  any  converse  except  with  my  own  im- 
pressions ;  they  are  grand  as  the  horizon  and  full  of 
God.  Nature  inspires  a  thousand  reflections  and  a 
kind  of  pleasing  melancholy.  I  know  not  what  it  is,  if 
it  be  not  a  secret  sympathy  of  our  infinite  soul  with 


453  THE   MOTHER   OF   LAMARTINE. 

the  infinitude  of  the  works  of  God.  When  I  turn  back 
and  see  from  the  mountain  height  the  little  light  that 
shines  in  the  chamber  of  my  children,  I  bless  Provi- 
dence for  having  given  me  this  secluded  and  quiet  rest 
to  brood  over  them." 

The  sympathetic  tenderness  and  sensibility  of  this 
true  womanly  and  motherly  soul  may  be  well  illus- 
trated by  an  incident  which  she  records  in  the  summer 
of  1801.  In  passing  through  a  cemetery  she  witnesses 
by  accident  the  burial  of  a  poor  man,  unknown  to  her 
by  name.  A  young  gui,  the  daughter  of  the  man  who 
was  dead,  on  hearing  the  first  shovelful  of  earth  fall 
upon  her  father's  coffin,  fainted  and  fell  helplessly  to 
the  ground.  Madame  de  Lamartine  put  lier  bottle  of 
smelling-salts  to  her  nostrils,  and  when  she  revived 
sufficiently,  assisted  her  to  her  own  house,  and  gave 
her  wine  and  a  biscuit,  which  soon  restored  her.  "  But 
what  really  comforted  her  most  was  that  I  myself 
wept  with  her,  and  that  all  my  little  ones,  seeing  me 
weep,  wept  also.  Thus  this  poor  dead  man  was,  for  his 
daughter's  sake,  sincerely  mourned  by  hearts  that  did 
not  then  even  know  his  name.  The  accounts  which 
the  girl  gave  us  of  her  father's  j)overty  and  sickness 
and  suifering  were  absolutely  sorrowful  and  heart- 
rending. Her  mother  w^as  also  dead,  having  died  less 
than  one  year  previously  ;  and  thus,  under  the  in- 
scrutable ways  of  Providence,  this  family  of  poor  little 
children  was  comx)letely  orphaned.  In  this  last  terri- 
ble affliction  may  Heaven  help  them  ! 

"Nothing  affects  the  poor  classes  of  the  people  s(> 
much  as  to  see  their  great  griefs  understood  and 
shared  by  symx)athizing  jiersons  whom  they  regard  as 


A    LOVING    AND   HAPPY   FAMILY.  453 

tlie  inheritors  of  a  different  nature  from  their  own.  At 
nightfall  we  took  the  poor  girl  back  to  her  hut,  at  the 
edge  of  the  grove,  where  her  little  brothers  were  wait- 
ing for  her  at  the  door,  and  j)iteously  asked  her  if  their 
father  was  not  coming  home.  The  circumstances  of 
this  solemn  episode  afforded  to  my  own  little  guis  the 
opportunity  of  acquiring  a  knowledge  of  some  of  the 
dreadful  realities  which  follow  the  inevitable  separa- 
tions caused  by  death,  and  which  they  themselves,  not 
to  speak  of  others,  must  some  day  endure.  We  should 
not  disguise  to  our  children  the  contingencies  of  life.  On 
the  contrary,  we  must  let  them  see  it  just  such  as  God 
has  been  pleased  to  make  it  for  us,  with  all  its  sweet- 
ness and  with  all  its  bitterness.  To  learn  to  suffer  is 
to  learn  to  live."  Lamartine's  mother  was  a  devoted 
wife,  and  loved  her  husband,  who  was  well  worthy  of 
her  love.  One  entry  says  :  "  To-day  I  am  in  such  a 
strange  state  of  sadness  and  despondency  that  I  can 
only  attribute  it  to  the  absence  of  my  husband."  Ten 
days  afterward  she  writes  :  ' '  My  husband  has  arrived, 
and  I  am  happy  !"  Her  affection  for  him  was  returned 
in  equal  measure.  Amid  privations  and  perils  he  tells 
her  :  "  So  that  neither  you  nor  our  children  are  taken 
from  me,  I  accept  all  else  ;  my  greatest  blessings  are  in 
your  hearts." 

A  terrible  anecdote  is  narrated  by  Madame  Lamartine 
of  Rousseau.  She  gives  it  as  told  her  by  her  mother, 
the  grandmother  of  Lamartine.  The  wife  of  the  Field- 
Marshal  of  Luxembourg,  with  whom  this  grandmother 
was  intimately  acquainted,  and  who  was  also  a  friend 
of  Rousseau,  perceived  that  the  unmarried  woman  he 
was  living  with  was  about  to  become  a  mother.     She 


454  THE   MOTHER   OF   LAMARTINE. 

was  afraid  tliat  Rousseau  miglit  intend  to  throw  this 
coming  child  into  the  foundlings"  hospital,  where,  as 
was  well  known,  he  had  already  thrown  three  of  his 
other  iEegitimate  children.  So  she  went  to  see 
Monsieur  Tronchin,  of  Geneva,  a  particular  friend  of 
Rousseau,  and  begged  him  earnestly  to  have  this  child 
when  born  brought  to  her,  as  she  wished  to  adopt  and 
rear  it.  Monsieur  Tronchin  spoke  of  it  to  Rousseau, 
who  apparently  gave  his  consent  without  hesitation. 
He  also  had  an  interview  with  the  mother  of  the  child 
about  it,  and  she  was  filled  with  joy  at  the  idea.  As 
soon  as  she  was  confined,  the  i)oor  woman  sent  infor- 
mation of  the  fact  to  M.  Tronchin.  He  came  ;  he  saw 
a  beautiful  child,  a  boy  full  of  life  and  promise.  He 
made  arrangements  with  the  mother  as  to  the  hour  at 
which  he  was  to  come  and  take  the  child  the  next  morn- 
ing ;  but  at  midnight  Rousseau,  wrapped  in  a  sombre- 
colored  cloak,  approached  the  bed  of  the  prostrate  and 
helpless  mother,  and,  in  spite  of  her  cries,  carried  away 
his  own  child  to  the  foundlings'  asylum,  and  there  left 
it  forever,  without  any  mark  of  recognition  or  distinc- 
tion. 

The  Psalmist  of  Israel  tells  us  that  man  was  made 
only  "  a  little  lower  than  the  angels,"  but  a  man  who 
could  so  act  against  all  the  instincts  of  the  parental 
nature  must  have  been  made  a  good  deal  lower  than 
the  brutes. 

On  March  6th,  1804,  Madame  de  Lamartine  ^vrites  in 
her  diary  :  "  To-day  is  the  anniversary  of  my  mar- 
riage. It  is  now  fourteen  years  since  I  had  the  happi- 
ness to  marry  a  man  who  seemed  to  be  endowed  with 
the  favor  of  Heaven.     I  knew  liim  to  be  very  amiable 


DEATH  OF   MADAME   LAMARTINE.  455 

and  good,  but  I  was  not  aware  that  lie  was  so  nearly 
perfect.  Almost  his  only  faults  are  his  scruples  of 
honor  and  an  uprightness  of  soul  that  takes  umbrage 
at  the  least  indelicacy  ;  but  these,  even  at  the  worst, 
are  the  least  serious  of  defects.  He  lives  only  for  me 
and  for  his  children  ;  and  often  he  has  many  cares  for 
such  a  numerous  family  with  so  small  a  fortune." 

Madame  de  Lamartine  sees  Pope  Pius  the  Seventli 
at  Lyons  when  he  comes  to  France  to  crown  Xapoleon. 
' '  I  came  here  with  my  sister  only  to  see  the  iDojDe  ; 
and  I  have  already  seen  him  pass  from  the  palace  of 
the  archbishop,  where  he  is  staying.  Yesterday  I 
attended  the  high  mass  celebrated  by  the  pope  in  the 
Church  of  St.  John.  I  saw  the  entire  ceremonies  very 
well,  but  had  great  difficulty  in  getting  near  enough  to 
the  altar  to  obtain  a  good  view  of  the  chief  celebrant. 
The  pious  old  man  has,  indeed,  a  saint-like  physiog- 
nomy, and  many  of  the  Roman  prelates  who  are  with 
him  are  also  men  whose  purity  of  personal  appearance 
answers  well  to  their  holy  calling."' 

The  "  Manuscrit  de  ma  Mere"  is  naturally  filled  with 
Napoleonic  incidents  and  battles  during  the  years  that 
followed  until  his  final  overthrow  and  exile  to  St. 
Helena.  The  last  words  in  her  manuscript  are  words 
of  benediction  for  all  who  were  dear  to  her,  even  for 
her  enemies.  She  died  on  the  28th  of  November,  1829, 
when  her  son  was  thirty -nine  years  of  age,  and  had 
just  fulfilled  her  brightest  hopes  for  him  by  being 
elected  a  member  of  the  French  Academy.  He  was 
not  with  her  when  she  died.  Another  brought  him  the 
sad  news,  "  You  have  no  longer  a  mother."  Her  death 
was  caused  by  the  accidental  escape  of  boiling  water 


456  THE   MOTHER   OF   LAMARTINE. 

upon  lier  while  slie  was  in  lier  bath.  In  the  evening, 
fever  and  delirium  set  in.  Then  came  a  great  calm,  a 
long  silence,  and  a  sweet  sleep,  from  which  she  awoke 
only  to  expire.  In  her  last  moments  she  murmured  in 
broken  accents,  "  My  husband.  .  .  .  my  children. 
.  .  .  Alphonse,  Marianne,  Cecilia,  Eugenie",  Sophia  ; 
God  bless  them  all !  Oh,  that  they  were  all  here  now 
so  that  He  might  bless  them  by  my  hand !  My 
Alphonse  !  How  grieved  he  will  be  not  to  have  been 
with  me  in  this  supreme  hour  !  Tell  him,  oh,  tell  him 
that  I  suffer  no  more  !  .  .  .  .  that  I  feel  already  as  if 
I  were  in  a  place  of  safety,  peace,  and  delight,  where  I 
behold  heaven  for  myself  and  manifold  blessings  in 
store  for  all  my  dear  children  who  are  yet  on  the 
earth."  Then  tow^ard  daybreak,  with  a  smile  upon 
her  lips,  she  murmured  feebly,  "  Oh,  how  happy  I 
am  !  My  God,  Thou  hast  not  deceived  me  !  Blessed 
be  Thy  name  !  I  am  happy  !  I  am  so  happy  !"  and 
died. 


MILTON'S   WIVES. 

John  Milton'  s  domestic  vicissitudes  were  in  strange 
contrast  -vvath  the  brightness  of  his  genius,  the  vast 
range  of  his  learning,  and  the  sublimity  of  his  works. 
He  was  three  times  married.  His  first  wife  was  Mary- 
Powell,  for  whom  an  ingenious  writer  has  concocted  an 
imaginary  diary  written  and  spelled  in  the  old  style, 
in  which  "  Journall,"  under  date  of  "  Forest  Hill, 
Oxon.,  May  1st,  1643,"  we  read  the  supposed  entry  : 
"  Seventeenth  Birthdaye.  A  Gypsie  Woman  at  the 
Gate  woulde  faine  have  tolde  my  Fortune  ;  but  Mother 
chased  her  away,  saying  she  had  doubtless  harboured 
in  some  of  the  low  Houses  in  Oxford,  and  might  bring 
us  the  Plague.  Coulde  have  cried  for  Vexation  ;  she 
had  promised  to  tell  me  the  colour  of  my  Husband's 
Eyes  ;  but  Mother  says  she  believes  I  shall  never  have 
one,  I  am  soe  sillie."  Mary  Powell  was,  however, 
destined  to  have  a  married  as  well  as  a  maiden  life,  and 
to  become  Mistress  Milton.  Although  no  gypsy  may 
have  foretold  to  her  the  personal  appearance  of  her 
future  husband,  we  have  him  "in  his  habit  as  he 
lived,"  not  only  from  authentic  portraits,  but  from  the 
accounts  of  his  contemporaries.  "  He  was  middle- 
sized,"  says  Toland,  his  friend  and  literary  defender, 
''and  well-proportioned,  his  deportment  erect  and 
manly,  his  hair  of  a  light  brown,  his  features  exactly 
regular,    his    complexion    wonderfully    fair    when    a 


458  MILTON'S   WIVES. 

youth,  and  ruddy  to  the  last. ' '  As  the  temper,  mind, 
and  habits  of  a  man  have  sometimes  much  more  to  do 
with  his  happiness  in  the  married  state  than  even  his 
complexion  and  good  looks,  we  may  quote  the  same 
authority  for  John  Milton's  having  been  "  affable  in 
conversation,  of  an  equal  and  cheerful  temper,  and 
highly  delighted  with  all  sorts  of  music,  in  which  he 
was  himself  not  meanly  skilled."  He  was,  we  learn 
further,  "  extraordinarily  temperate  in  his  diet,  which 
was  anything  most  in  season,  or  the  easiest  procured, 
and  was  no  friend  to  sharj)  or  strong  liquors."  Such  a 
man  ought  surely  to  have  made  an  agreeable  husband. 
He  would  not  be  likely  to  complain  of  his  dinner  or 
tax  her  culinary  and  artistic  powers  too  severely. 

But  his  eulogist  Toland  says  further  :  "  The  love  of 
books  exceeded  all  his  other  passions.  In  summer  he 
would  be  stirring  at  four  in  the  morning,  and  in  winter 
at  five  ;  but  at  night  he  used  to  go  to  bed  by  nine." 
These  hours  and  his  absorbing  literary  occupations 
would  not  suit  the  aspirations  of  every  woman. 
Literary  men,  poets,  and  philosophers  are  oftener 
unfortunate  in  their  conjugal  relations  than  the  ordi- 
nary run  of  men,  and  "  George  Eliot"  has  depicted  in 
^'  Middlemarch"  the  isolation  and  disappointment 
which  a  young  girl  feels  when  tied  to  a  man  old 
enough  to  be  her  father,  who  loves  her  rather  less  than 
he  does  his  books.  IMilton  and  his  first  wife  may  have 
been  somewhat  like  Mr.  Casaubon  and  Gwendoline  in 
their  mutual  relations.  This  is  merely  conjecture, 
however,  and  the  story  of  Milton's  first  marriage  must 
be  left  to  speak  for  itself. 

In  the  early  part  of  the  summer  of  1643,  Milton,  who 


MARRIAGE  TO   MISS     POWELL.  459 

was  then  in  his  thirty -fifth  year,  took  a  sudden  journey 
into  the  country,  "  nobody  about  him  certainly  know^ 
ing  the  reason,  or  that  it  was  any  more  than  a  journey 
of  recreation.  He  was  absent  about  a  month,  and  when 
he  returned  he  brought  back  a  wife  with  him.  Nor 
was  the  bride  alone.  She  was  attended  by  some  few 
of  her  nearest  relations,"  and  there  was  feasting  and 
nuptial  celebration  in  Milton's  house  in  Aldergate 
Street,  London. 

The  name  of  the  bride  has  been  already  mentioned. 
She  was  the  eldest  daughter  of  Richard  Powell, 
Esquire,  of  Forest  Hill,  a  village  about  five  miles  from 
Oxford,  where  her  father  had  a  house  and  estate  of 
some  300  pounds  a  year,  equal  to  about  1200  pounds  at 
the  present  day.  Forest  Hill  was  situated  within  the 
ancient  royal  forest  of  Shotover,  of  which  Mr.  Powell 
was  the  lessee.  Milton's  father  had  been  born  at  Stan- 
ton St.  John,  the  adjoining  parish  to  Forest  Hill,  and 
Richard  Milton,  the  poet's  grandfather,  had  been  the 
under-ranger  of  the  royal  forest.  There  had  been 
transactions  between  the  Miltons  and  the  Powells  as 
far  back  as  1627.  In  paying  a  visit  to  the  neighbor- 
hood, John  Milton  was  treading  on  ancestral  ground 
and  renewing  an  old  acquaintance  with  the  Powell 
family.  Powell  had  a  large  family,  lived  far  beyond 
his  means,  as  did  many  other  royalist  gentlemen,  and 
had  been  borrowing  money  for  the  past  twenty  years, 
among  others  of  Milton' s  father,  a  prosperous  scrivener, 
who  lived  over  his  shop  in  Breed  Street,  Cheapside, 
which  bore  the  sign  of  the  Spread  Eagle,  and  where 
John  Milton,  his  eldest  son,  was  born,  on  December  9th, 
1608.     Squire  Powell  was  already  deeply  mortgaged  to 


460  MILTON'S    WIVES. 

the  Miltons,  but  found  no  difficulty  in  promising  a 
portion  of  1000  pounds  with  his  daughter,  which,  of 
course,  he  never  paid.  Milton  wooed  and  won  Mary 
Powell,  and  with  his  marriage  his  miseries  began. 
''  From  this  day  forward,"  says  Mark  Patteson,  rector 
of  Lincoln  College,  Oxford,  his  latest  biographer, 
"misery,  the  importunities  of  business,  the  clamor  of 
controversy,  crowned  by  the  crushing  calamity  of 
blindness,  were  to  be  his  portion  for  more  than  thirty 
years.  Singular  among  poets  in  the  serene  fortune  of 
the  first  half  of  his  life,  in  the  second  half  his  piteous 
fate  was  to  rank  in  wretchedness  with  that  of  his  mas- 
ters, Dante  and  Tasso." 

Milton  "  hasted  too  eagerly  to  light  the  nuptial 
torch,"  but,  as  Mr.  Patteson  remarks,  it  is  very  easy  to 
say,  after  the  event,  that  a  man  of  his  puritanical  con- 
victions and  habits  should  have  known  better  than 
to  marry  a  girl  in  her  teens,  of  a  Cavalier  family,  and 
transplant  her  from  "  a  roystering  home,  frequented 
by  the  dissolute  officers  of  the  Oxford  garrison,  to  the 
spare  diet  and  philosophical  retirement  of  a  recluse 
student,  and  to  have  looked  for  sympathy  and  response 
for  his  speculations  from  an  uneducated  and  frivolous 
girl."  But  Milton,  who  held  the  Puritan  notions,  bor- 
rowed from  the  Jews,  of  the  inferiority  and  subjection 
of  women,  may  have  deemed  it  an  easy  task  to  mould 
and  fashion  his  handmaid-wife  to  his  own  will.  His 
fancy,  moreover,  had  got  the  better  of  his  judgment. 
His  poems  prove  that  he  was  very  susceptible  to  female 
charms,  and  though  Mary  Powell  was  not  beautiful,  she 
had  youth  and  country  freshness,  and  her  "  unliveli- 
ness  and  natural  sloth,  unfit  for  conversation,"  j^assed 


ABANDOXS  HER  HUSBAND.  461 

as  "the  bashful  muteness  of  a  vu-gin"  of  seventeen. 
"Whether  it  was,""  says  Toland,  "that  this  young 
woman,  accustomed  to  a  large,  jovial  family,  could  not 
live  in  a  philosophical  retirement  ;  or  that  she  was  not 
perfectly  satisfied  with  the  person  of  her  husband  ;  or, 
lastly,  that  because  all  her  relations  were  devoted 
to  the  royal  interest,  his  democratical  principles  were 
disagreeable  to  their  humor  (nor  is  it  improbable  the 
father  repented  of  his  match,  upon  the  prospect  of 
some  success  on  the  king's  side,  who  then  had  his 
headquarters  at  Oxford),  or  whatever  was  the  reason, 
'tis  certain,  that  after  he  had  enjoyed  her  company  at 
London  for  about  a  month,  she  was  invited  by  her 
friends  to  spend  the  rest  of  the  summer  in  the  country  ; 
to  which  he  consented,  on  condition  that  she  returned 
at  Michaelmas.  Yet  he  saw  her  not  at  the  time 
appointed,  and  after  receiving  several  of  his  letters 
without  sending  him  any  answer,  she  did  at  length 
positively  refuse  to  come,  dismissing  his  messenger 
with  contempt."  It  was  clear  that,  as  Mary  Powell 
had  married  John  Milton  to  please  her  parents,  she  had 
now  abandoned  him  for  the  same  reason.  Whatever 
may  have  been  the  "  true  inwardness"  of  the  separa- 
tion— and  many  theories  have  been  invented — the 
Powells  explained  the  matter  politically,  and  regretted 
having  matched  the  eldest  daughter  of  their  house 
with  a  violent  Republican  and  Presbyterian. 

Milton,  after  the  fashion  of  the  times,  vented  his 
wrongs  by  a  consideration  of  the  whole  subject  under 
which  they  might  be  classified.  He  published  a  pam- 
phlet on  "  The  Doctrine  and  Discipline  of  Divorce,"  at 
first  anonymously,  but  put  his  name  to  the  second  and 


462  MILTON'S   WIVES. 

much  enlarged  edition.  No  allusion  is  made,  however, 
to  his  own  case,  and  if  there  were  no  other  sources  of 
information  the  author  might  be  supposed  to  be  arguing 
the  question  of  marriage  merely  from  an  abstract  point 
of  view.  The  pamphlet  was  published  in  February, 
1644,  and  dedicated  to  Parliament  and  to  the  Assembly 
of  Divines  at  Westminster.  The  design  of  it  was  to 
show  that  there  are  other  sufficient  reasons  for  divorce 
besides  those  mentioned  by  Moses  and  by  Christ.  The 
main  position  is,  "  that  indisposition,  unfitness,  and 
contrary  humors,  proceeding  from  any  unchangeable 
cause  in  nature,  hindering  and  always  likely  to  hinder 
the  main  ends  and  benefits  of  conjugal  society — that  is 
to  say,  peace  and  delight — are  gTeater  reasons  of  divorce 
than  adultery  or  natural  frigidity,  provided  there  be  a 
mutual  consent  for  separation." 

Professor  David  Masson,  whose  life  of  Milton  in  six 
octavo  volumes,  with  a  total  of  some  five  thousand 
pages,  has  been  pronounced  "  the  m.ost  exhaustive  bi- 
ography that  was  ever  compiled  of  any  Englishman," 
discovered  a  copy  of  the  first  edition  of  this  pamphlet 
with  the  printed  date  of  August  1st.  If  this  date  be 
the  true  one,  then  Milton  was  writing  it  during  the 
honeymoon,  and  while  his  wife  was  living  with  him. 
Such  behavior  on  Milton's  part,  "he  being  in  his 
thirty-fifth  year  and  his  wife  but  seventeen,  seems  in- 
credible, unless  we  accept  an  hypothesis  started  by  a 
writer  in  the  Athenceum  that  she  not  only  treated 
him  with  contumely,  but  refused  his  embraces.  "If," 
says  the  Rev.  Rector  Patteson,  of  Oxford,  "  Milton 
was  brooding  over  this  seething  agony  of  passion  all 
through  July,  with  the  young  bride,  to  whom  he  had 


EXHIBITS   A   NOBLE    NATURE.  463 

been  barely  wedded  a  montli,  in  the  house  where  he 
was  writing,  then  the  only  apology  for  this  outrage 
upon  the  charities,  not  to  say  decencies  of  home,  is  that 
which  is  suggested  by  the  passage  referred  to" — a  pas- 
sage, namely,  in  the  pamphlet  itself  from  which  the 
\\Titer  in  the  AthencBUTn  drew  the  inference  we  have 
alluded  to.  "Then  the  pamphlet,"  he  continues, 
"  however  imprudent,  becomes  pardonable.  It  is  a 
passionate  cry  from  the  depths  of  a  great  despair  ; 
another  evidence  of  the  noble  purity  of  a  nature  which 
refused  to  console  itself  as  other  men  would  have  con- 
soled themselves  ;  a  nature  which,  instead  of  an  ego- 
tistical whine  for  its  own  deliverance,  sets  itself  to 
plead  the  common  cause  of  man  and  of  society.  He 
gives  no  intimation  of  any  indi\ddual  interest,  but  his 
argument  throughout  glows  with  a  white  heat  of  con- 
cealed emotion,  such  as  could  only  be  stirred  by  the 
sting  of  some  personal  and  present  misery. ' ' 

Milton,  when  his  wife  deserted  him,  might  have  said, 
as  John  Wesley  subsequently  said,  Won  illam  dimisi, 
non  revocaho.  "  I  did  not  send  her  away,  and  I  will 
not  take  her  back. "  If  he  did  not  form  this  determina- 
tion, it  was  because  there  seemed  no  probability  of  the 
lady  ever  asking  him  to  take  her  back.  Meanwhile  he 
consoled  himself,  in  a  virtuous  way,  by  Platonic  friend- 
ships with  other  women,  especially  with  two  who  were 
far  superior  in  beauty  of  person  and  vivacity  of  intel- 
lect to  the  runaway  Mary  Powell.  One  of  these  was 
the  Lady  Margaret  Ley,  a  lady  "  of  great  wit  and  in- 
genuity," attached  to  the  Parliamentary  cause,  and 
mentioned  as  the  "honored  Margaret"  of  his  Tenth 
Sonnet.     She   was   the  A^fe   of  a  Captain  Hobson,    a 


404  MILTON'S    WIVES. 

"  very  accomplished  gentleman"  residing  at  the  Isle  of 
Wight.  For  the  other  he  seems  to  have  cherished  the 
design  of  a  more  intimate  relationship.  She  was  a 
Miss  Davis,  daughter  of  a  Dr.  Davis,  of  whom  nothing 
else  is  known  except  that  he  was  her  father.  She  is 
sux)posed  to  be  "  the  virtuous  young  lady"  of  his 
Mnth  Sonnet,  and  he  described  her  as  "in  the  prime 
of  earliest  youth. ' '  She  is  spoken  of  in  Phillips'  s  brief 
narrative  as  a  very  handsome  and  witty  gentlewoman. 
Milton,  in  the  dedication  of  the  last  of  his  divorce  X)am- 
phlets,  which  he  entitled  "  Tetrachordon,"  to  Parlia- 
ment, had  concluded  with  the  threat,  "  If  the  law 
make  not  a  timely  provision,  let  the  law,  as  reason  is, 
bear  the  censure  of  the  consequences."  There  is  no 
doubt  that  he  did  not  intend  to  remain  single,  even  if 
the  law  forbade  him  to  marry  again  while  his  wife 
lived.  Phillips  says  that  he  proposed  such  a  union 
with  Miss  Davis,  but  that  she  was  not  prepared,  as  he 
was,  to  brave  the  world's  opinion. 

The  suit  was  ended  by  a  remarkable  episode.  Mary 
Milton's  departure  was  singular  enough,  but  her  return 
was  even  more  so.  The  friends  of  both  parties  formed 
a  conspiracy  to  bring  them  together  again.  Since 
October,  1643,  when  Milton's  messenger  had  been  dis- 
missed with  opprobrium  from  the  house  of  the  Powells 
at  Forest  Hill,  great  changes  had  happened.  The  as- 
pect of  the  civil  war  was  not  the  same.  The  Presby- 
terian army  had  been  replaced  by  the  Independent 
army,  and  as  an  immediate  result  the  royal  cause  had 
declined,  and  its  total  ruin  was  effected  at  the  battle  of 
iS^aseby,  in  June,  1645.  Oxford  was  closely  invested 
by  the  Parliamentary  army.  Forest  Hill  was  occujpied 


RETURNS   TO  HER  HUSBAND.  465 

by  the  besiegers,  and  the  proud  Cavalier  family  that 
had  treated  Milton,  their  creditor  as  well  as  son-in-law, 
so  scurvily,  was  compelled  to  take  refuge  within  the 
lines  of  the  university  city.  Financial  bankruptcy  had 
come  upon  the  Powells,  and  no  doubt  these  considera- 
tions, added  to  the  fact  that  Milton  was  now  a  rising 
man  with  a  manifest  career  before  him,  had  far  more 
weight  with  them  than  any  rumors  they  may  have 
heard  of  the  devotion  he  was  paying  to  Miss  Davis.  The 
victorious  Independents  were  Milton' s  party,  and  such 
a  son-in-law  might  prove  a  potent  protector  to  his  wife' s 
family  in  the  days  of  darkness  that  were  falling  upon 
them.  Mrs.  Mary  Milton  always  threw  the  blame  of 
her  conduct  to  her  husband  upon  her  mother.  A  world- 
ly mother  would  be  sure  to  look  to  the  main  chance. 
While  Milton  was  a  nobody,  except  a  bookworm,  she 
had  counselled  her  daughter's  disobedience  and  deser- 
tion ;  now  that  Milton  was  somebody,  and  his  star  was 
clearly  in  the  ascendant,  she  urged  her  to  seek  a  recon- 
ciliation with  him.  None  but  a  magnanimous-natured 
husband  would  have  taken  her  back ;  but  Milton, 
though  stern  at  times,  as  all  the  Puritans  were,  had  a 
magnanimous  nature.  A  '^surprise  party"  of  a  most 
unexpected  kind  was  arranged  for  him.  There  was  a 
house  in  St.  Martin's  le  Grand,  London,  where  Milton 
was  a  frequent  visitor.  On  an  occasion  when  he  was 
known  to  be  coming,  his  young  wife,  who  had  been 
fetched  from  Oxford  on  purpose,  was  secreted  in  an  ad- 
joining room,  and  when  he  had  come  she  was  suddenly 
brought  into  his  presence,  and  throwing  herself  at  his 
feet  she  burst  into  tears  and  begged  his  forgiveness. 
The  foolish  girl  was  now  only  nineteen,  and  two  years 


466  MILTON'S   WIVES. 

of  reflection  and  rougli  experience  had  taught  her  the 
error  of  her  way.  Her  mother,  she  declared  to  him, 
"  had  been  all  along  the  chief  j)romoter  of  her  froward- 
ness."  Milton,  with  a  generosity  that  did  him  credit, 
"  a  noble,  leonine  clemency,"  as  Phillii)s  calls  it,  beg- 
ged her  to  let  bygones  be  bygones,  and,  as  she  profess- 
ed her  willingness  to  live  with  him  as  a  good  wife,  he 
received  her  to  his  house  in  Barbican,  to  which  he  had 
recently  removed  from  Aldersgate  Street.  Nor  did  his 
benevolence  end  here.  Ill  as  the  Powells  had  deserved 
of  him  and  of  his  father,  to  whom  they  were  heavily  in 
debt,  he  received  them  all  into  his  home,  when  their 
estate  at  Forest  Hill  was  sequestrated,  not  excepting 
even  the  shrewd  mother-in-law  who  had  separated  his 
wife  from  him,  and  might  again  disturb  his  domestic 
peace.  This  was  after  the  surrender  of  Oxford,  in 
June,  1646.  Squire  Powell  died  in  Milton's  house  at 
the  end  of  that  year. 

When  his  father-in-law's  affairs  were  wound  up, 
Milton,  in  satisfaction  of  his  claim  of  £1500  (£1000  of 
which  was  for  his  wife's  dower,  and  £500  for  a  loan 
made  in  1627),  came  into  possession  of  some  property 
at  Wheatley,  Oxon,,  consisting  of  the  tithes,  certain 
cottages,  and  three  and  a  half  yards  (!)  of  land.  This 
property  had  produced  in  all  only  £40  a  year  during 
the  recent  civil  war,  but  as  property  had  increased  in 
value  after  the  war  closed,  Milton  found  that  he  could 
let  the  whole  for  double  that  amount.  Out  of  this  he 
had  to  pay  Mr.  Powell's  composition,  reduced  to  £130  in 
Milton's  petition,  and  the  widow's  jointure,  computed 
at  £26  13,9.  4d.  per  annum.  What  of  income  remained 
after  these  disbursements  he  might  apply  toward  re- 


MILTON'S   PARENTS.  467 

paying  himself  tlie  old  loan  of  1627.  This  was  all  Mil- 
ton ever  saw  of  the  £1000,  which  Squire  Powell,  with 
the  munificence  of  a  bankrupt  Cavalier,  had  promised 
to  pay  Milton  as  his  daughter  s  portion. 

The  death  of  Milton's  father-in-law  was  followed  in 
three  months  by  that  of  his  father.  He  died  in  the 
house  in  Barbican,  and  the  entry,  "  John  Milton,  gen- 
tleman, loth  (March),"  among  the  burials  in  March, 
1646,  is  still  to  be  seen  in  the  register  of  the  parish  of 
St.  Giles's,  Cripplegate.  The  younger  John  Milton  was 
deeply  indebted  to  the  elder,  and  never  lost  an  opportu- 
nity of  acknowledging  the  obligation.  In  the  present 
volume  we  have  traced  the  genius  and  character  of 
many  eminent  men  to  the  influence  of  their  mothers. 
Milton  was  an  exception.  It  was  chiefly  to  his  father's 
excellent  taste,  sound  judgment,  and  constant  care  that 
he  owed  his  love  of  learning  and  his  opportunities  of 
acquiring  it.  He  has  left  among  his  poems  some  Latin 
hexameters,  ^'  Ad patrem,'''  to  his  father,  full  of  more 
than  filial  gratitude  and  feeling.  And  in  his  pamphlet 
of  the  "  Reason  of  Church  Government,"  he  speaks  of 
"  the  ceaseless  diligence  and  care  of  my  father,  whom 
God  recompenses." 

His  mother's  name  before  her  marriage  was  Sarah 
Caston.  She  is  described  as  a  "  woman  of  incompara- 
ble virtue  and  goodness."  They  had  two  other  chil- 
dren, besides  the  poet — Anna,  who  married  Edward 
Phillips,  the  father  of  the  author  of  the  narrative 
already  quoted,  and  Christopher,  who  was  bred  to  the 
law.  After  his  father's  and  father-in-law's  death,  his 
wife's  relations  seem  to  have  scattered,  and  Milton,  now 
in  easier  circumstances,  gave  up  taking  pupils,   and 


468  MILTON'S   WIVES. 

quitted  the  large  house  in  Barbican  for  a  smaller  one 
in  High  Holborn,  opening  backward  upon  Lincoln's 
Inn  Fields.  This  must  have  been  about  Michaelmas, 
in  1647. 

Four  years  after  the  death  of  his  first  wife,  with 
whom  he  seems  to  have  lived  happily  from  the  date  of 
her  return  to  him  until  her  death,  which  occurred  in 
1653,  at  another  of  his  residences,  so  often  changed. 
Petty  France,  since  called  York  Street,  Westminster, 
close  to  St.  James's  Park,  Milton  married  again.  His 
first  wife  had  borne  him  three  daughters,  of  whom  we 
shall  speak  presently.  His  second  wife  was  Catherine, 
the  daughter  of  Captain  Woodcock,  of  Hackney,  '^  a 
zealous  sectarist, ' '  but  of  her  we  know  nothing  except 
what  can  be  gathered  from  the  affecting  poetical  trib- 
ute (Sonnet  XIX.)  which  he  paid  to  her. 

"ON  HIS  DECEASED  WIFE. 

"  Methought  I  saw  my  late  espoused  saint 

Brought  to  me  like  Alcestis,  from  the  grave, 
Whom  Jove's  great  son  to  her  glad  husband  gave, 

Rescued  from  death  by  force,  though  pale  and  faint ; 
Mine,  as  whom  washed  from  spot  of  childbed  taint, 

Purification  in  the  old  law  did  save, 
And  such,  as  yet  once  more  I  trust  to  have 

Full  sight  of  her  in  heaven  without  restraint, 
Came  vested  all  in  white,  pure  as  her  mind  ! 

Her  face  was  veiled  ;  yet  to  my  fancied  sight, 
Love,  sweetness,  goodness,  in  her  person  shined 

So  clear,  as  in  no  face  with  more  delight. 
But  oh  !  as  to  embrace  me  she  inclined, 

I  waked  ;  she  fled  ;  and  day  brought  back  my  night." 


GROWING   BLIND.  469 

The  concluding  words  bear  evident  allusion  to  his 
own  blindness.  The  exact  nature  of  the  disease  which 
l^roduced  it  has  in  his  case  never  been  determined. 
His  pathetic  account,  written  to  his  friend  Leonard 
Philarus,  of  Athens,  dated  Westminster,  September 
28th,  1654,  contains  all  that  we  can  know  about  it  : 
"  It  is  now  about  ten  years,  I  think,  since  I  first  per- 
ceived my  sight  beginning  to  grow  weak  and  dim.  .  .  . 
When  I  sate  down  to  read  as  usiial  in  the  morning,  my 
eyes  gave  me  considerable  pain,  and  refused  their  office 
till  fortified  by  moderate  exercise  of  body.  If  I  looked 
at  a  candle,  it  appeared  surrounded  by  an  iris.  In  a 
little  time,  a  darkness  covering  the  left  side  of  the  left 
eye,  which  was  partially  clouded  some  years  before  the 
other,  interrupted  the  view  of  all  things  in  that  du^ec- 
tion.  Objects  also  in  front  seemed  to  dwindle  in  size 
whenever  I  closed  my  right  eye.  This  eye,  too,  for 
three  years  gradually  failing,  a  few  months  previous, 
while  I  was  perfectly  stationary,  everything  seemed  to 
swim  backward  and  forward  ;  and  now  thick  vai^ors 
appear  to  settle  upon  my  forehead  and  temples,  which 
weigh  down  nay  eyes  with  an  oppressive  sense  of  drow- 
siness, especially  in  the  interval  between  the  dinner 
and  evening.  .  .  I  ought  not  to  omit  mentioning  that, 
before  1  wholly  lost  my  sight,  as  soon  as  I  lay  down  in 
bed,  and  turned  upon  either  side,  brilliant  flashes  of 
light  used  to  issue  from  my  closed  eyes  ;  and  after- 
ward, upon  the  gradual  failure  of  any  power  of  vision, 
colors  proportionately  dim  and  faint  seemed  to  rush 
out  with  a  degree  of  vehemence  and  a  kind  of  inward 
noise.     These  have  now  faded  into  uniform  blackness. 


470  MILTON'S   WIVES. 

such  as  ensues  on  the  extinction  of  a  candle  ;  or  blaciv- 
ness,  varied  only  and  intermingled  with  a  dunnisli 
gray.  The  constant  darkness,  however,  in  which  I 
live  day  and  night,  inclines  more  to  a  whitish  than  a 
blackish  tinge  ;  and  the  eye  in  turning  itself  round 
admits,  as  through  a  narrow  chink,  a  very  small  por- 
tion of  light.  But  this,  though  it  may  offer  a  glance 
of  hope  to  the  physician,  does  not  prevent  me  from 
making  up  my  mind  to  my  case,  as  evidently  beyond 
the  reach  of  cure  ;  and  I  often  reflect,  that  as  many 
days  of  darkness,  according  to  the  wise  man  (Eccles. 
11 :  8),  are  allotted  to  us  all,  mine,  which  by  the  singular 
favor  of  the  Deity,  are  divided  between  leisure  and 
study,  and  are  recreated  by  the  conversation  and  inter- 
course of  my  friends,  are  more  agreeable  than  those 
deadly  shades  of  which  Solomon  is  speaking.  But  if, 
as  it  is  written,  '  Man  shall  not  live  by  bread  alone, 
but  by  every  word  that  proceedeth  out  of  the  mouth  of 
God '  (Matt.  4  :  4),  why  should  not  each  of  us  like- 
wise acquiesce  in  the  reflection  that  he  derives  not 
the  benefit  of  his  sight  from  his  eyes  alone,  but  from 
the  guidance  and  Providence  of  the  same  Supreme 
Being  'I  ^Yhile  He  looks  out  and  provides  for  me  as 
He  does,  and  leads  me  about  as  it  were  with  His  hand 
through  the  paths  of  life,  I  willingly  surrender  my 
own  faculty  of  vision  in  conformity  to  His  good 
pleasure  ;  and  with  a  heart  as  strong  and  as  steadfast 
as  if  I  were  a  Lynceus,  I  bid  you,  my  Philarus,  fare- 
well r' 

In  two  of  his  sonnets  Milton   expressed   the   same 
resignation  under  his  affliction. 


SONNETS.  471 


"  ON  HIS  BLINDNESS. 

**  When  I  consider  how  my  life  is  spent, 

Ere  half  my  days,  in  this  dark  world  and  wide, 
And  that  one  talent  which  is  death  to  hide, 

Lodged  with  me  useless,  though  my  soul  more  bent 

To  serve  therewith  my  Maker,  and  present 
My  true  account,  lest  He,  returning,  chide, 
'  Doth  God  exact  day  labor,  light  denied  ? ' 

I  fondly  ask  ;  but  patience,  to  prevent 

That  murmur,  soon  replies,  '  God  doth  not  need 

Either  man's  works,  or  His  own  gift  ;  who  best 

Bears  His  mild  yoke  they  serve  Him  best  :  His  state 
Is  kingly  ;  thousands  at  His  bidding  speed, 

And  post  o'er  land  and  ocean  without  rest  ; 
They  also  serve  who  only  stand  and  wait." 

The  other  of  the  two  sonnets  on  this  subject  is  ad- 
dressed 

"TO  CYRIAC  SKINNER. 

"  Cyriac,  this  three  years'  day  these  eyes,  though  clear, 

To  outward  view,  of  blemish  or  of  spot. 

Bereft  of  light,  their  seeing  have  forgot  ; 
Nor  to  their  idle  orbs  doth  siglit  appear, 
Of  sun  or  moon,  or  star,  thi-oughout  the  year, 

Or  man,  or  woman.     Yet  I  argue  not 

Against  Heaven's  hand,  or  will,  nor  bate  a  jot 
Of  heart  or  hope  ;  but  still  bear  up  and  steer 
Right  onward.     What  supports  me,  dost  thou  ask  ? 

The  conscience,  friend,  to  have  lost  them  overplied 
In  liberty's  defence,  my  noble  task, 

Of  which  all  Europe  rings  from  side  to  side. 
This  thought  might  lead  me  through  the  world's  vain  mask 

Content,  though  blind,  had  I  no  better  guide." 


472  MILTON'S  WIVES. 

Milton  s  second  wife,  Catherine  Woodcock,  whom,  as 
we  have  seen,  he  wrote  of  as  his  ' '  late  espoused 
saint,'"  in  whom  "  love,  sweetness,  goodness  sinned," 
died  in  1658,  after  only  fifteen  months'  union  with 
him,  and  after  having  given  birth  to  a  daughter,  who 
lived  only  a  few  months. 

The  blind  bard,  probably  for  the  sake  of  having  a 
protector  for  his  daughters,  the  youngest  of  whom  was 
only  eight  at  the  Restoration,  as  well  as  a  companion 
for  himself,  consulted  his  friend  and  medical  adviser. 
Dr.  Paget,  as  to  the  selection  of  a  third  wife,  and  by 
his  advice  he  married  Elizabeth  Minshull,  of  a  very 
respectable  family  near  Nautwich,  in  Cheshire.  She 
was  a  distant  relative  of  Dr.  Paget,  and  he,  as  a  sincere 
friend  to  Milton,  no  doubt  knew  her  well,  and  was  satis- 
fied that  she  had  the  requisite  qualifications  for  the 
delicate  and  arduous  work  of  tending  the  blind  bard 
and  philosopher  in  the  evening  of  his  life.  She  fully 
justified  the  good  physician's  selection.  The  marriage 
took  place  in  February,  1663,  about  ten  years  after  the 
death  of  Milton's  first  wife,  and  five  years  after  the 
death  of  his  second.  During  the  remaining  eleven 
years  of  the  poet's  life  his  wants  were  ministered  to 
by  a  prudent,  thoughtful,  and  capable  gentlewoman. 
There  is  little  evidence  as  to  what  she  was  like,  either 
mentally  or  physically.  Aubrey,  who  knew  her  per- 
sonally, says  she  was  "  a  genteel  person  of  a  peaceful 
and  agreeable  humor. "  And  there  is  every  reason  to 
believe  that  this  account  of  her  was  true.  Bishop 
Xewton,  of  Bristol,  who  lived  nearly  a  century  after- 
ward, wrote,  in  1749,  that  he  had  heard  she  was  ' '  a 
woman  of  a  most  violent  spirit,  and  a  hard  mother  in- 


MILTON'S  THIRD  WIFE.  473 

law  to  Ms  children."  It  is  certain  that  she  revered  her 
husband  and  studied  his  comfort.  Marv  Fisher,  a 
maid-servant  in  the  house,  deposed  that  at  the  end  of 
his  life,  when  he  was  sick  and  infirm,  his  wife  having 
provided  something  for  dinner  which  she  thought  he 
would  fancy,  he  "  spake  to  his  said  wife  these  or  like 
words,  as  near  as  this  deponent  can  remember  :  '  God 
have  mercy,  Betty,  I  see  thou  wilt  perform  according 
to  thy  promise,  in  providing  me  such  dishes  as  I  think 
fit  while  I  live,  and  when  I  die,  thou  knowest  I  have 
left  thee  all. '  "  Another  anecdote  of  his  third  wife  is 
less  authentic,  though  it  has  been  accepted  by  Alexan- 
der Pope  and  others  of  some  weight — namely,  that 
Charles  the  Second,  having  offered  Milton  the  post  of 
Latin  secretary  to  the  Government,  the  same  office 
which  he  had  held  under  Cromwell,  and  his  wife  urg- 
ing him  to  accept  it,  he  said  to  her  :  "  Thou  are  in  the 
right ;  you,  as  other  women,  would  ride  in  your  coach  ; 
for  me,  my  aim  is  to  live  and  die  an  honest  man." 
But  it  seems  wholly  improbable,  after  Milton's  politi- 
cal disaffection,  and  all  he  had  written  against  mon- 
archy, especially  against  the  Stuarts,  that  the  restored 
king  would  have  made  him  such  an  offer. 

The  Restoration,  which  took  place  in  1660,  found 
Milton  stone  blind,  and  with  all  his  hopes  blasted  and 
all  his  political  efforts  nullified,  at  the  age  of  fifty-two. 
He  had  drank  too  deeply  of  the  living  waters  of  faith, 
resignation,  and  manly  courage,  to  give  way  to  useless, 
repinings,  and  despair.  He  returned  to  the  muse  fi'om 
which  politics  had  for  twenty  years  estranged  him, 
but  which  still  had  kept  ''  a  bower  quiet  for  him  and 
a  sleep  full  of  soft  dreams."     The  grand  loneliness  of 


474  MILTON'S   WIVES. 

Milton,  it  has  been  well  observed,  "  is  reflected  in  his 
three  great  poems  by  a  sublime  independence  of  human 
sympathy  like  that  with  which  mountains  fascinate 
and  rebuff  us." 

The  house  in  Breed  Street,  Cheapside,  in  which 
Milton  was  born,  was  burned  in  the  great  fire  of  Lon- 
don, and  this  was  typical  of  the  destruction  which  the 
Revolution  had  made  of  his  political  and  principal  for- 
tunes. He  died  without  much  pain,  on  the  8th  of  No- 
vember, 1674,  and  Hay  ley  says  of  the  place  and  mode 
of  his  departure  :  "  Soon  after  his  marriage,  in  1661,  he 
had  removed  from  his  house  in  Jewin  Street  to  a  house 
in  the  Artillery  Walk,  leading  to  Bunhill  Fields,  a 
spot  that,  to  his  enthusiastic  admirers,  may  appear 
consecrated  to  his  genius.  Here  he  resided  at  that 
period  of  his  days  when  he  was  peculiarly  entitled  to 
veneration  ;  here  he  probably  finished  no  less  than 
three  of  his  most  admirable  works  ;  and  here,  with  a 
dissolution  so  easy  that  it  was  unperceived  by  the 
I)ersons  in  his  bedchamber,  he  closed  a  life,  clouded 
indeed  by  uncommon  and  various  calamities,  yet  en- 
nobled by  the  constant  exercise  of  such  rare  endow- 
ments as  render  his  name,  perhaps,  the  very  first  in 
that  radiant  and  comprehensive  list  of  which  England, 
the  most  fertile  of  countries  in  the  produce  of  mental 
power,  has  reason  to  be  proud."  He  was  buried  in  St. 
Giles's  Church,  Cripplegate. 

After  the  loss  of  his  sight  Milton  was  dependent 
upon  others  for  reading  and  writing.  His  last  wife 
does  not  appear  to  have  assisted  him  in  this  literary 
way,  but  he  had  taught  his  daughters  to  read,  though 
not  to  understand,  several  languages,  and  they  rendered 


A   LOW   ESTIMATE  OF   WOMAN.  475 

him  some  service  wlien  no  poor  scholar  was  at  hand. 
This  they  did,  however,  with  so  ill  a  grace  that  "  the 
old  man  eloquent' '  thus  refers  to  them  in  his  last  will 
and  testament,  or  rather  in  the  directions  he  gave  his 
brother  Christopher  concerning  it  a  few  months  before 
he  died :  "  Brother,  the  portion  due  to  me  from  Mr. 
Powell,  my  first  wife's  father,  I  leave  to  the  unkind 
children  I  had  by  her  ;  but  I  have  received  no  part  of 
it ;  and  my  will  and  meaning  is  they  have  no  other 
benefit  from  my  estate  than  the  said  portion,  and 
what  I  have  besides  done  for  them,  they  having  been 
very  undutiful  to  me  ;  and  all  the  residue  of  my 
estate  I  leave  to  the  disposal  of  Elizabeth,  my  loving 
wife." 

Their  conduct  may  perhaps  be  explained,  if  not  pal- 
liated, by  the  way  in  which  their  father  had  trained 
them.  Although  he  wrote  of  woman  in  the  loftiest 
strain,  in  practice  he  regarded  her  merely  as  the 
"  help"  and  servant  of  man.  He  would  not  allow  his 
daughters  to  learn  any  language,  saying  that  one 
tongue  was  enough  for  a  woman.  They  were  never 
sent  to  school,  but  had  received  some  sort  of  teaching 
at  home  from  a  governess.  To  make  them  useful  to 
himself  he  taught  them  to  read  aloud  in  five  or  six 
languages,  ancient  and  modern,  but  did  not  allow  them 
to  understand  a  word  of  any  of  them.  A  little  more 
labor  would  have  made  their  task  intelligible  and 
themselves  intelligent.  As  an  inevitable  result  of  this 
unreasonable  treatment,  his  daughters  behaved  badly 
to  him,  and  his  condition  resembled  somewhat  that  of 
King  Lear.  One  daughter  alone  spoke  kindly  of  him 
after  his  death,  Deborah,   to  whom,  says  Aubrey,  he 


476  MILTON'S   WIVES. 

had  really  taught  some  Latin  and  who  acted  as  his 
amanuensis.  "Milton's  youngest  daughter,''  says 
Richardson,  "  sj)oke  of  her  father  with  great  tender- 
ness. She  said  he  was  delightful  company,  the  life  of 
the  conversation,  and  that  on  account  of  a  flow  of  sub- 
ject, and  an  unaffected  cheerfulness  and  civility." 
This  was  said  when  she  was  an  old  woman.  The 
second  daughter,  Mary,  w^ho  was  like  her  mother, 
Mary  Powell,  in  person  and  in  her  headstrong  dis^DOsi- 
tion,  resisted  and  disobeyed,  and  at  last  hated  her 
father.  When  some  one  spoke  in  her  presence  of  her 
father's  ai)proaching  marriage  (to  his  third  wife)  she 
said,  "  that  was  no  news  to  hear  of  his  wedding  ;  but 
if  she  could  hear  of  his  death,  that  was  som.ething." 
She  combined  with  Anna,  the  eldest  daughter,  who  had 
a  handsome  face,  but  was  deformed  and  had  an  im- 
pediment in  her  speech,  "  to  counsel  his  maid-ser- 
vant to  cheat  him  in  his  marketings.  They  sold  his 
books  without  his  knowledge ;  and  he  was  often 
heard  to  complain  that  they  thought  nothing  of  desert- 
ing him."  They  lived  with  him  for  five  or  six  years 
after  his  last  marriage,  but  at  last  their  presence 
became  intolerable,  and  they  were  sent  out  to  earn 
their  own  living  at  the  trade  of  embroidery  in  gold  and 
silver.  When  Deborah,  the  youngest,  was  shown  in 
1725  Faithorne's  crayon  drawing  of  the  jDoet,  without 
being  told  for  whom  it  was  intended,  she  immediately 
exclaimed,  "  0  Lord  !  that  is  the  picture  of  my  fa- 
ther !"  and  stroking  down  the  hair  of  her  forehead, 
added,  "  Just  so  my  father  wore  his  hair." 

Milton's  will  was  contested  by  his  daughters,  and 
being  found  irregular  in  form  it  was  set  aside  and  let- 


LOVE   OF   MUSIC   AND   FLOWERS.  477 

ters  of  administ ration  were  granted  to  his  widow,  who 
is  said  to  have  allotted  £100  to  each  of  them. 

Milton's  only  recreation  except  conversation  was 
music.  He  played  the  organ  and  the  bass-viol — the 
organ  most.  Sometimes  he  would  sing  himself,  or  get 
his  wife  to  sing  for  him,  though  she  had,  he  said,  no  ear, 
yet  a  good  voice.  That  one  whose  ear  was  so  attuned 
to  "  the  music  of  the  spheres,"  whose  harmony  within 
was  so  celestial,  and  whose  imagery  was  the  sublimest 
of  this  or  the  angelic  world,  should  be  a  lover  of  music 
is  only  what  one  should  expect.  What  a  contrast  did 
the  music  in  his  own  soul  present  to  the  discord  of  his 
domestic  life,  until  the  last  few  years  of  it.  Next  to 
his  delight  in  music  was  his  fondness  for  gardens.  He 
took  care  to  have  one  attached  to  every  house  he  lived 
in,  and  would  pass  four  hours  at  a  time  among  the 
flowers  and  fruits  which  he  loved  long  after  he  had  lost 
the  power  of  seeing  them. 

The  direct  line  of  Milton,  like  that  of  Shakspeare, 
whom  he  comes  next  to  among  the  chief  of  English 
poets,  is  extinct.  Anne,  his  eldest  daughter,  married 
an  architect,  and  died  when  her  first  infant  was  born. 
Mary,  the  second,  died  unmarried,  Deborah  married 
Mr,  Clark,  a  weaver  in  Spitalsfields  ;  she  died  in  1727, 
aged  seventy-six.  As  her  family  was  numerous,  and 
also  poor,  Joseph  Addison,  Secretary  of  State  to  Queen 
Anne,  made  her  a  present,  and  Queen  Caroline  pre- 
sented her  with  fifty  guineas.  In  1750,  Milton's 
Comus  was  played  at  one  of  the  London  theatres, 
for  the  benefit  of  one  of  Mrs.  Clark's  daughters,  Mrs. 
Elizabeth  Forster,  who  was  found  by  Dr.  Birch  and 
Dr.  Newton,   two  of  her  grandfather's  biographers, 


478  MILTON'S   WIVES. 

keeping  a  little  chandler-shop,  in  the  city,  poor,  aged, 
and  infirm.  One  hundred  and  thirty  pounds  were  thus 
gained  for  her  and  her  family,  a  husband  and  seven 
children.  These  all  died  before  their  mother,  and  her 
own  death  closed  John  Milton's  line.  His  brother 
Christopher,  who  had  always  been  a  royalist  and  whom 
his  influence  had  sheltered  during  the  Commonwealth, 
was  knighted  and  made  a  judge  by  King  James  the 
Second,  but  ill  health  compelled  him  to  retire  into  ob- 
scurity. 

Elizabeth  Milton,  the  poet's  widow,  sold  the  copy- 
right of  "  Paradise  Lost,"  for  which  the  poet  himself 
had  received  in  all  £10.  His  contract  with  Samuel 
Simmons,  or  Symons,  for  it  is  spelled  both  ways,  the 
printer,  is  in  the  British  Museum,  and  is  dated  April 
27th,  1667.  The  author  received  £5  down  ;  another  £5 
when  the  first  edition  was  sold  ;  a  third  £5  was  to  be 
received  for  the  second  edition,  and  a  fourth  £5  for 
the  third  edition.  He  died  before  the  second  edition 
was  published  ;  and  his  widow  sold  her  remaining 
claims  for  £8.  At  the  end  of  two  years,  thirteen  hun- 
dred copies  had  been  circulated.  In  five  years  after 
this  the  second  edition  came  out,  and  in  four  years 
more  the  third.  Before  the  end  of  twenty  years  this 
immortal  poem  had  passed  through  twenty  editions. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  CARLYLE. 

Caelyle,  in  ^\T^'iting  of  his  parents  in  his  "  Remi- 
niscences," in  1832,  gives  the  year  of  their  marriage  as 
1795,  and  describes  his  mother,  Margaret  Aitken,  to 
have  been  the  best  of  all  mothers,  "to  whom,"  he 
says,  "  I  owe  endless  gratitude.  By  God's  great  mercy, 
she  is  still  left  as  a  head  and  centre  to  us  all,  and  may 
yet  cheer  us  with  her  pious  heroism  through  many 
toils,  if  God  so  please."  "  I  am,"  he  adds,  "  the 
eldest  child,  born  in  1795,  December  4th,  and  trace 
deeply  in  myself  the  character  of  both  parents,  also 
the  upbringing  and  example  of  both  ;  the  inheritance 
of  their  natural  health,  had  not  I  and  Time  beat  on  it 
too  hard." 

All  the  world  knows  Carlyle's  history,  for  he  has 
A\Titten  it  in  the  hundreds  of  letters  left  behind  him, 
and  in  his  "Reminiscences."  His  literary  executor, 
James  Anthony  Froude,  has  given  it  in  picturesque  lan- 
guage in  his  "  Life  of  Carlyle,"  and  lastly,  it  is  written 
in  Mrs.  Carlyle's  letters.  No  literary  man  of  any  age 
was  ever  better  knoAvn  to  the  reading  world.  It  would 
be  a  work  of  supererogation  to  attempt  to  write  any- 
thing that  would  present  Carlyle  in  a  different  light 
from  what  has  already  been  given.  But  it  is  a  pleasant 
task  to  write  of  his  mother,  for  he  has  made  it  possible 
for  much  to  be  said  of  her. 

His  father  was  a  mason,  and  with  his  brother,  who 


480  THE  MOTHER  OF  CARLYLE. 

was  his  partner,  was  established  at  Ecclefechan.  His 
son  makes  him  out  a  great  man,  but  admits  that  in 
his  finer  nature  he  was  but  "  half  developed.""  Mrs. 
Carlyle/)wned  to  her  son  "  that  she  could  never  under- 
stand him  ;  that  her  affection  and  (with  all  their  little 
strifes)  her  admiration  of  him  were  obstructed."  He 
was  an  outwardly  cold  and  silent  man,  and  was  re- 
served  even  with  his  wife  and  children.  The  son 
relates  an  instance  when  he  saw  him  unbend  from  his 
austere  manner  and  shed  tears.  He  says  :  "  It  was 
when  the  remains  of  my  mother's  fever  hung  upon  her, 
in  1817,  and  seemed  to  threaten  the  extinction  of  her 
reason.  We  were  all  of  us  nigh  desperate,  and  our- 
selves nigh  mad.  He  burst  out  at  last  into  quite  a  tor- 
rent of  grief,  cried  piteously,  and  threw  himself  on  the 
floor  and  lay  moaning,  I  wondered,  and  had  no  words, 
no  tears.  It  was  as  if  a  rock  of  granite  had  melted, 
and  was  thawing  into  water."  The  wife  and  mother 
was  for  a  time  out  of  her  head,  but  she  ultimately  re- 
covered. The  family  was  intensely  clannish,  and  the 
father,  if  but  "  half  developed,"  was  a  shrewd  observer, 
and  was  not  slow  to  note  the  promise  of  his  son.  He 
counselled  with  the  mother,  and  then  decided  to  send 
their  boy  to  college.  The  wise  men  of  Ecclefechan 
shook  their  heads  and  said  it  was  a  risk  ;  it  was  a 
waste  of  money  ;  it  was  wrong  to  educate  a  boy, 
because  he  grows  up  to  despise  his  ignorant  par- 
ents. 

He  was  sent  to  college  nevertheless,  his  parents 
walking  a  part  of  the  way  with  him  as  he  with  another 
lad  of  the  place  started  on  theu-  j^edestrian  trip  to 
Edinburgh.     The  two  walked  twenty  miles  a  day  until 


THE  FAMILY   HOME.  481 

their  journey's  end  was  reached,  and  for  the  four  years 
that  Carlyle  remained  at  college  he  annually  walked 
the  distance. 

Mr.  Carlyle  bought  a  farm  during  the  last  year  of 
his  son's  stay  in  Edinburgh,  not  far  from  Annan, 
where  Carlyle  taught  school  after  leaving  college.  To 
be  near  his  mother  was  the  solace  of  his  life.  He 
hated  teaching,  and  nothing  reconciled  him  to  his  task 
but  the  weekly  visit  to  his  family  and  the  thought  that 
he  was  helping  them.  His  mother  and  sisters,  as  his 
father  and  brothers,  worked  very  hard  on  the  farm,  and 
at  this  time  his  mother  could  not  write  him,  so  that  to 
hear  from  her  personally  he  had  to  go  to  Mainhill. 
Mr.  Froude  thus  describes  this  home,  which  was  so 
dear  to  all  the  family  : 

"  The  house  itself  is,  or  was  when  the  Carlyles  occupied  it,  of  one 
story,  and  consisted  of  three  rooms — a  kitchen,  a  small  bedroom,  and 
a  large  one  connected  by  a  passage.  The  door  opens  into  a  square 
farm-yard,  on  one  side  of  which  are  stables,  on  the  other  side  oppo- 
site the  door  the  cow  byres,  on  the  third  a  wash-house  and  dairy. 
The  situation  is  high,  utterly  bleak,  and  swept  by  all  the  winds. 
Not  a  tree  shelters  the  premises  ;  the  fences  are  low,  the  wind  per- 
mitting nothing  to  grow  but  stunted  thorn.  The  view  alone  redeems 
the  dreariness  of  the  situation.  On  the  left  is  the  great  hill  of 
Burnswark.  Broad  Annandale  stretches  in  front  down  to  the 
Solway,  which  shines  like  a  long  silver  riband  ;  on  the  right  is 
Hoddam  Hill,  with  the  Tower  of  Repentance  on  its  crest,  and  the 
wooded  slopes  which  mark  the  line  of  the  river.  Beyond  towers  up 
Criffel,  and  in  the  far  distance  Skiddaw,  and  Saddleback,  and 
Helvellyn,  and  the  high  Cumberland  ridges  on  the  track  of  the 
Roman  wall.  Here  lived  Carlyle's  father  and  mother  with  their 
eight  children,  Carlyle  himself  spending  his  holidays  with  them  ;  the 
old  man  and  his  younger  sons  cultivating  the  sour  soil  and  winning 
a  hard-earned  living  out  of  their  toil,  the  mother  and  daughters 


■i82  THE   MOTHER   OF   CARLYLE. 

doing  the  household  work  and  minding  cows  and  poultry,  and  taking 
their  turn  in  the  field  with  the  rest  in  harvest  time." 

Carlyle  went  to  teach  at  Kirkcaldy,  and  was  now 
permanently  separated  from  the  home  circle.  Father, 
mother,  brothers,  and  sisters  all  wrote  him  constantly, 
and  all  received  replies.  In  one  of  his  father's  letters 
occurs  this  reference  to  his  mother :  "  Your  mother 
thought  to  have  wi'itten  to  you  ;  but  the  carrier 
stopped  only  two  days  at  home,  and  she  being  a  slow 
writer  could  not  get  it  done,  but  she  will  write  next 
opportunity.  I  add  no  more  but  your  mother's  com- 
pliments, and  she  sends  you  half  the  cheese  that  she 
was  telling  you  about. " 

He  was  a  good  father,  this  stern  Scotch  yeoman, 
and  his  interest  in  his  absent  son  was  as  intense  as  a 
father's  could  be.  Had  the  mother  been  less  devoted 
to  him  Carlyle  would  have  seen,  perhaps,  some  exhibi- 
tions of  affection  which  were  left  unexpressed  because 
he  was  sadsfied  with  the  love  of  his  mother,  and  asked 
no  more.  Once,  when  he  had  an  attack  of  dyspepsia 
while  in  Edinburgh  with  his  pupils,  he  wrote  a  letter 
home  that  frightened  all  the  family.  His  brother 
John,  who  had  succeeded  him  as  a  teacher  in  Annan 
school,  was  sent  for  by  the  anxious  parents,  and  the 
result  was  a  touching  letter,  which  is  quoted  entire,  to 
show  the  affection  which  bound  this  excellent  house- 
liold  together : 

"  Mainhill,  February,  1820. 

"I  have  just  arrived  from  Annan,  and  we  are  all  so  uneasy  on 

your  account  that  at  the  request  of  my  father  in  particular,  and  of  all 

the  rest,  I  am  determined  to  write  to  call  on  you  for  a  speedy  answer. 

Your  father  and  mother,  and  all  of  us,  are  extremely  anxious  that 


INTEREST   IN   THEIR   SON.  488 

you  should  come  home  directly,  if  possible,  if  you  think  you  can 
come  without  danger.  And  we  trust  that,  notwithstanding  the 
bitterness  of  last  summer,  you  will  still  find  it  emphatically  a  home. 
My  mother  bids  me  call  upon  you  to  do  so  by  every  tie  of  affection, 
and  by  all  that  is  sacred.  She  esteems  seeing  you  again  and  admin- 
istering comfort  to  you  as  her  highest  felicity.  Your  father,  also,  is 
extremely  anxious  to  see  you  again  at  home.  The  room  is  much 
more  comfortable  than  it  was  last  season.  The  roads  are  repaired, 
and  all  things  more  convenient  ;  and  we  all  trust  that  you  will  yet 
recover,  after  you  shall  have  inhaled  your  native  breezes  and  escaped 
once  more  from  the  unwholesome  city  of  Edinburgh,  and  its  selfish 
and  unfeeling  inhabitants.  In  the  name  of  all,  then,  I  call  upon  you 
not  to  neglect  or  refuse  our  earnest  wishes  ;  to  come  home  and 
experience  the  comforts  of  parental  and  brotherly  affection,  which, 
though  rude  and  without  polish,  is  yet  sincere  and  honest." 

The  father  adds  a  postscript : 

"  My  dbak  Tom  :  I  have  been  very  uneasy  about  you  ever  since  we 
received  your  moving  letter,  and  I  thought  to  have  written  to  you 
myself  this  day,  and  told  you  all  my  thoughts  about  your  health, 
which  is  the  foundation  and  copestone  of  all  our  earthly  comfort. 
But,  being  particularly  engaged  this  day,  I  caused  John  to  write. 
Come  home  as  soon  as  possible,  and  forever  oblige, 

"  Dear  son,  your  loving  father, 

"  James  Carltle." 

The  mother  was  written  to  immediately,  and  quieted 
with  assurance  that  the  attack  was  not  dangerous,  and 
that  the  patient  would  soon  be  well.  Carlyle  was  not  a 
submissive  sufferer,  and  he  made  an  outcry  over  phys- 
ical pains  which  were  not  serious  beyond  causing  him 
annoyance. 

Mrs.  Carlyle  was  an  earnest  Calvinist,  and  in  season 
and  out,  she,  after  she  had  learned  penmanship,  wrote 
to  her  son  regarding  his  si)iritual  welfare.     She  urged 


484  THE   MOTHER   OF   CARLTLE. 

liim  to  mind  the  golden  season  of  youth,  and  seek  his 
Creator  while  He  might  yet  be  found.  Along  with 
much  pious  instruction  she  frequently  added  practical 
information  regarding  butter  and  ham  sent  him.  The 
thoughtful  mother  provided  him  with  the  siibstantials 
of  his  modest  table  and  knit  his  socks  for  him.  Eveii. 
after  he  went  to  Edinburgh  to  try  his  fortunes  she  sent 
him  eatables,  and  urged  him  to  send  home  his  clothing 
that  she  might  renew  his  wardrobe  again.  If  she 
detected  the  slightest  despondency  in  his  letters  she  at 
once  wrote  him,  asking  to  be  allowed  to  do  all  that  she 
could  for  him,  and  then  offering  such  admonition  as 
this  : 

' '  Oh,  my  dear,  dear  son,  I  would  pray  for  a  blessing  on  your  learn- 
ing. I  beg  you,  with  all  the  feeling  of  an  affectionate  mother,  that 
you  would  study  the  Word  of  Crod,  which  He  has  graciously  put  in 
our  hands,  that  it  may  powerfully  reach  our  hearts,  that  we  may 
discern  it  in  its  true  light.  God  made  man  after  His  own  image, 
therefore  he  behoved  to  be  without  any  imperfect  faculties.  Beware, 
my  dear  son,  of  such  thoughts  ;  let  them  not  dwell  on  your  mind. 
God  forbid  !  But  I  dare  say  you  will  not  care  to  read  this  scrawl. 
Do  make  religion  your  great  study,  Tom  ;  if  you  repent  it,  I  will 
bear  the  blame  forever." 

There  existed  between  Carlyle  and  his  mother  a 
peculiar  and  passionate  attachment.  All  his  letters 
show  his  deep  love  for  her.  He  tells  her  that  "  he  can 
never  be  sufficiently  grateful,  not  only  for  the  common 
Idndness  of  a  mother,  but  for  the  unceasing  watchful- 
ness with  which  she  strove  to  instil  virtuous  principles 
into  his  young  mind."     In  another  letter  he  says  : 

"  I  know  well  and  feel  deeply  that  you  entertain  the  most  solici- 
tous anxiety  about  my  temporal,   and  still  more  about  my  eternal 


HIS   MOTHER'S   ANXIETY.  485 

welfare  ;  as  to  the  former  of  which,  I  have  still  hopes  that  all  your 
tenderness  will  yet  be  repaid  ;  and  as  to  the  latter,  though  it 
becomes  not  the  human  worm  to  boast,  I  would  fain  persuade  you 
not  to  entertain  so  many  doubts.  Your  character  and  mine  are  far 
more  similar  than  you  imagine  ;  and  our  opinions  too,  though  clothed 
in  different  garbs,  are,  I  well  know,  still  analogous  at  bottom.  I 
respect  your  religious  sentiments,  and  honor  you  for  feeling  them 
more  than  if  you  were  the  highest  woman  in  the  world  without  them. 
Be  easy,  I  entreat  you,  on  my  account  ;  the  world  will  use  me  better 
than  before  ;  and  if  it  should  not,  let  us  hope  to  meet  in  that  upper 
country,  when  the  vain  fever  of  life  is  gone  by,  in  the  country  where 
all  darkness  shall  be  light,  and  where  the  exercise  of  om-  affections 
will  not  be  thwarted  by  the  infirmities  of  human  nature  any  more. ' ' 

This  was  a  gloomy  period  of  Carlyle's  life,  but  to 
Ms  family  he  made  the  best  of  his  situation.  He  had 
no  friends  in  Edinburgh,  and  his  employment  as  a  tutor 
was  not  regular.  He  was  unhappy  and  unsettled,  and 
the  future  was  not  bright  before  him.  His  mother's 
love  and  kindness  touched  him  deeply,  and  he  care- 
fully treasured  every  letter  that  she  wrote  to  him. 
The  following  letter,  like  many  more  sent  him  at  that 
time,  is  full  of  anxiety  for  his  physical  welfare  arid 
religious  state  : 

"  Son  Tom  :  I  received  your  kind  and  pleasant  letter.  Nothing  is 
more  satisfying  to  me  than  to  hear  of  your  welfare.  Keep  up  your 
heart,  my  brave  boy.  You  ask  kindly  after  my  health.  I  complain 
as  little  as  possible.  When  the  day  is  cheerier,  it  has  a  great  effect 
on  me.  But  upon  the  whole  I  am  as  well  as  I  can  expect,  thank 
God.  I  have  sent  a  little  butter  and  a  few  cakes  with  a  box  to  bring 
home  your  clothes.  Send  them  all  home,  that  I  may  wash  and  sort 
them  once  more.  Oh,  man,  could  I  but  write  !  I'll  tell  ye  a'  when 
we  meet,  but  I  must  in  the  mean  time  content  myself.  Do  send  me  a 
long  letter  ;  it  revives  me  greatly  ;  and  tell  me  honestly  if  you  read 
your  chapter  e'en  and  morn,  lad.     You  mind  I  hod  if  not  your  hand, 


486  THE   MOTHER   OF   CARLYLE. 

I  hod  your  foot  of  it.     Tell  me  if  there  is  anything  you  want  in  par- 
ticular.    I  must  run  to  pack  the  box,  so  I  am 

"  Your  affectionate  mother, 

"  Margaret  Carlyle." 

Carlyle' s  name  stands  forever  linked  with  the  domes- 
tic circle  to  which  he  belonged.  No  other  famous  man 
of  letters  is  so  closely  and  permanently  associated  with 
home  and  family.  He  was  a  noble  son  and  faithful 
brother,  and  whatever  his  faults  as  a  man,  he  was  a 
hero  to  his  own  kindred. 

None  of  his  family  were  so  gifted  as  he,  but  all  were 
thoughtful  and  earnest,  and  he  never  had  cause  to 
be  troubled  on  account  of  their  want  of  cultivation. 
There  was  no  false  pride,  no  attempts  to  be  what  they 
were  not,  in  any  of  the  name.  They  had  solid  worth, 
and  were  aspiring  and  ambitious  people,  though  silent 
and  undemonstrative  even  with  each  other. 

There  is  a  letter  of  Carlyle' s  to  his  mother,  written 
when  he  was  a  tutor  at  Kinnaird  House,  which  is  full 
of  protestations  of  affection.  With  it  he  sent  her  a 
check  for  a  small  sum  of  money.     It  is  as  follows  : 

*'  This  letter  may  operate  as  a  spur  on  the  diligence  of  my  beloved 
and  valuable  correspondents  at  Mainhill.  There  is  a  small  blank 
made  in  the  sheet  for  a  purpose  which  you  will  notice.  I  beg  you  to 
accept  the  little  picture  which  fills  it  without  any  murmuring.  It  is 
a  poor  testimonial  of  the  grateful  love  I  should  ever  bear  you.  If  I 
hope  to  get  a  moderate  command  of  money  in  the  course  of  my  life's 
operations,  I  long  for  it  chiefly  that  I  may  testify  to  those  dear  to 
me  what  affection  I  entertain  for  them.  In  the  mean  time  we  ought 
to  be  thankful  that  we  have  never  known  what  it  was  to  be  in  fear 
of  want,  but  have  always  had  wherewith  to  gratify  one  another  by 
these  little  acts  of  kindness,  which  are  worth  more  than  millions 
unblest  by  a  true  feeling  between  the  giver  and  receiver.     You  must 


AX   ADMIRER  OF  "MEISTER."  487 

buy  yourself  any  little  odd  things  you  want,  and  think  I  enjoy  it 
along  with  you,  if  it  add  to  your  comfort.  I  do  indeed  enjoy  it  with 
you.  I  should  be  a  dog  if  I  did  not.  I  am  grateful  to  you  for  kind- 
ness and  true  affection  such  as  no  other  heart  will  ever  feel  for  me. 
I  am  proud  of  my  mother,  though  she  is  neither  rich  nor  learned.  If 
I  ever  forget  to  love  and  reverence  her,  I  must  cease  to  be  a  creature 
myself  worth  remembering.  Often,  my  dear  mother,  in  solitary, 
pensive  moments  does  it  come  across  me  like  the  cold  shadow  of 
death,  that  we  two  must  part  in  the  course  of  time.  I  shudder  at 
the  thought,  and  find  no  refuge  except  in  humbly  trusting  that  the 
great  God  will  surely  appoint  us  a  meeting  in  that  far  country  to 
which  we  are  tending.  May  He  bless  you  forever,  my  good  mother, 
and  keep  up  in  your  heart  those  sublime  hopes  which  at  present  serve 
as  a  pillar  of  cloud  by  day  and  a  pillar  of  fire  by  night  to  guide  your 
footsteps  through  the  wilderness  of  life.  We  are  in  His  hands.  He 
will  not  utterly  forsake  us.     Let  us  trust  in  Him." 

Carlyle  sent  his  family  "  Meister,"  which  he  had 
translated,  to  read,  and  Goethe' s  novel  found  an  appre- 
ciative admirer  in  Mrs.  Carlyle.  His  brother  John,  in 
writing  to  him,  says  of  his  mother  :  "  She  is  sitting 
here  as  if  under  some  charm,  reading  '  Meister,'  and 
has  nearly  got  through  the  second  volume.  Though 
we  are  often  repeating  honest  Hall  Foster's  denounce- 
ment against  readers  of  '  novels, '  she  still  continues 
to  persevere.  She  does  not  relish  the  character  of  the 
women,  especially  of  Philina  :  they  are  so  wanton. 
She  cannot  well  tell  what  it  is  that  interests  her.  I 
defer  till  the  next  time  I  write  to  give  a  full  account 
of  the  impression  it  has  made  upon  us  all,  for  we  have 
not  got  it  fairly  started  yet." 

Mr.  Froude  characterizes  Carlyle' s  affection  for  his 
mother  as  the  strongest  personal  passion  which  he 
experienced  through  all  his  life.     She  was  proud  and 


488  THE  MOTHER  OF  CARLYLE. 

wilful  as  he.  He  was  continually  sending  her  money 
or  presents,  and  for  some  rebuke  of  hers  on  this  score 
he  wrote  her  this  letter,  dated 

"  Birmingham,  August  29,  1824. 

"  I  must  suggest  some  improvements  in  your  diet  and  mode  of  life 
which  might  be  of  service  to  you^  who  I  know  too  well  have  much  to 
suffer  on  your  own  part,  though  your  affection  renders  you  so  exclu- 
sively anxious  about  me.  You  will  say  you  cannot  he  fashed.  Oh, 
my  dear  mother,  if  you  did  but  think  of  what  value  your  health  and 
comfort  are  to  us  all,  you  would  never  talk  so.  Are  we  not  all  bound 
to  you  by  sacred  and  indissoluble  ties  ?  Am  I  not  so  bound  more 
than  any  other  ?  Who  was  it  that  nursed  me  and  watched  me  in  fro- 
wardness  and  sickness  from  the  earliest  dawn  of  my  existence  to  this 
hour  ?  My  mother.  Who  is  it  that  has  struggled  for  me  in  pain  and 
sorrow  with  undespairing  diligence,  that  has  for  me  been  up  early 
and  down  late,  caring  for  me,  laboring  for  me,  imweariedly  assisting 
me  ?  My  mother.  Who  is  the  one  that  never  shrunk  from  me  in  my 
desolation,  that  never  tired  of  my  despondencies,  or  shut  up  by 
a  look  or  tone  of  impatience  the  expression  of  my  real  or  imaginary 
griefs  ?  Who  is  it  that  loves  me  and  will  love  me  forever  with  an 
affection  which  no  chance,  no  misery,  no  crime  of  mine  can  do  away  ? 
It  is  you,  my  mother.  As  the  greatest  favor  that  I  can  beg  of  you, 
let  me,  now  that  I  have  in  some  degree  the  power,  be  of  some  assist- 
ance in  promoting  your  comfort.  It  were  one  of  the  achievements 
which  I  could  look  back  upon  with  most  satisfaction  from  all  the 
stages  of  my  earthly  pilgrimage,  if  I  could  make  you  happier.  Are 
we  not  all  of  us  animated  by  a  similar  love  to  you  ?  Why  then  will 
you  spare  any  trouble,  any  cost,  in  what  is  valuable  beyond  aught 
earthly  to  every  one  of  us?" 

Carlyle  was  living  in  London  during  the  time  he  was 
completing  his  "Life  of  Schiller,"  and  after  it  was 
finished  he  went  to  Mainhill.  His  brother  had  mean- 
while taken  a  farm  for  him,  which  this  brother  (Aleck) 
was  to  manage,  and  his  family  had  been  busy  fixing 


AT   HODDAM   HILL.  489 

it  for  him.  It  was  but  two  miles  from  his  father' s  farm, 
and  was  called  Hoddam  Hill.  There  were  but  a  few 
acres  of  land  attached  to  it.  His  parents  wanted  him 
to  make  his  home  among  them,  but  he  was  engaged  to 
be  married,  and  had  plans  for  a  separate  home.  He 
did  not  expect  his  fiancee,  Miss  Welsh,  to  live  at 
Hoddam  Hill,  but  he  hoped  to  restore  his  health  and 
then  go  elsewhere.  He  could  not  live  at  home  and  do 
his  work  with  so  many  about  him,  and  his  ways  of 
living  w^ere  not  suited  to  the  exactions  of  a  farmer's 
home.  His  mother  and  two  little  sisters  went  with 
him  and  his  brother,  and  there  Miss  Welsh  visited 
them.  She  had  promised  him  that  when  he  was  settled 
she  would  pay  a  visit  to  him  and  see  with  her  own  eyes 
her  future  relatives,  and  the  kind  of  a  home  he  was 
inviting  her  to  share.  Their  engagement  at  this  time 
promised  to  be  a  protracted  one,  but  a  circumstance 
occurred  which  hastened  it,  unexpectedly  to  both.  It 
is  not  necessary  in  this  sketch  of  the  mother  of  Carlyle 
to  enter  into  the  particulars  of  this  engagement  between 
Carlyle  and  Miss  Welsh,  because  the  facts  are  familiar 
to  all  English-speaking  readers  through  the  recent 
biographies  of  these  two  now  most  thoroughly  known 
characters. 

Miss  Welsh  had  suddenly  made  up  her  mind  that 
as  the  marriage  was  to  be,  it  should  be  over  with  as 
soon  as  she  should  make  his  family  a  visit,  and  plan 
with  him  for  their  immediate  future. 

Carlyle  says  of  this  visit  : 

"  She  stayed  with  us  above  a  week  [Carlyle  writes],  happy,  as  was 
very  evident,  and  making  happy.  Her  demeanor  among  us  I  could 
define   as   unsurpassable,    spontaneously   perfect.       From    the    first 


490  THE   MOTHER   OF   CARLYLE. 

moment  all  embarrassment,  even  my  mother's,  as  tremulous  and 
anxious  as  she  naturally  was,  fled  away  without  return.  Everybody 
felt  the  all-pervading  simple  grace,  the  perfect  truth  and  perfect 
trustfulness  of  that  beautiful,  cheerful,  intelligent,  and  sprightly 
creature,  and  everybody  was  put  at  his  ease.  The  questionable  visit 
was  a  clear  success.  She  and  I  went  riding  about,  the  weather  dry 
and  gray,  nothing  ever  going  wrong  with  us  ;  my  guidance  taken  as 
beyond  criticism  ;  she  ready  for  any  pace,  rapid  or  slow,  melodious 
talk  never  wanting.  Of  course  she  went  to  Mainhill,  and  made  com- 
plete acquaintance  with  my  father  (whom  she  much  esteemed  and 
even  admired,  now  and  henceforth — a  reciprocal  feeling,  strange 
enough),  and  with  my  two  elder  sisters,  Margaret  and  Mary,  who 
now  officially  kept  house  with  my  father  there.  On  the  whole,  she 
came  to  know  us  all,  saw  face  to  face  us  and  the  rugged  peasant 
element  and  way  of  life  we  had  ;  and  was  not  afraid  of  it,  but  recog- 
nized, like  her  noble  self,  what  of  intrinsic  worth  it  might  have, 
what  of  real  human  dignity.  She  charmed  all  hearts,  and  was  her- 
self visibly  glad  and  happy,  right  loath  to  end  these  halcyon  days, 
eight  or  perhaps  nine  the  utmost  appointed  sum  of  them. ' ' 

And  Froude  adds  of  this  visit : 

"  Two  little  anecdotes  she  used  to  tell  of  this  visit,  showing  that 
under  peasant's  dresses  there  was  in  the  Carlyles  the  essential  sense 
of  delicate  high  breeding.  She  was  to  use  the  girls'  room  at  Main- 
hill  while  there  ;  and  it  was  rude  enough  in  its  equipments  as  they 
lived  in  it.  Margaret  Carlyle,  doing  her  little  best,  had  spread  on 
the  deal  table  for  a  cover  a  precious  new  shawl  which  some  friend 
had  given  her.  More  remarkable  was  her  reception  by  the  father. 
"When  she  appeared  he  was  in  his  rough  dress,  called  in  from  his  farm 
work  on  the  occasion.  The  rest  of  the  family  kissed  her.  The  old 
man,  to  her  surprise,  drew  back,  and  soon  left  the  room.  In  a  few 
minutes  he  came  back  again,  fresh  shaved  and  washed,  and  in  his 
Sunday  clothes.  '  Now, '  he  said,  '  if  Miss  "Welsh  allows  it,  I  am 
in  a  condition  to  kiss  her  too.'  "When  she  left  Hoddam,  Carlyle 
attended  her  back  to  Dumfries." 


A  PITIFUL  TRAGEDY.  491 

The  visit  was  over,  and  Miss  Welsh  returned  to  her 
home,  pleased  with  her  lover's  family,  and  more  than 
ready  to  become  one  of  them.  Her  presence  was  a 
bright  interlude  in  their  lives,  and  between  Mrs.  Carlyle 
and  Miss  Welsh  there  was  formed  an  attachment  that 
remained  strong  through  life.  Carlyle,  happier  now 
that  the  result  of  the  visit  was  so  satisfactory,  worked 
with  more  courage,  and  his  mother  remained  with  him. 
Their  evenings  were  spent  together,  with  his  brother 
Aleck  and  the  two  younger  sisters,  and  Carlyle  and 
his  mother  smoked  their  pipes  as  the  others  sat  about 
them  chatting.  The  pleasant  home  at  Hoddam  Hill 
was  not  long  kept ;  differences  occurred  between  the 
landlord  and  Carlyle,  and  the  place  was  given  up. 
The  Mainhill  home  was  owned  by  the  same  landlord, 
and  old  Mr.  Carlyle  decided  to  move  from  it.  The 
family  w^ent  to  Scotsbrig,  in  the  neighborhood  of 
Ecclefechan,  where  they  rented  a  fine  farm,  upon  which 
the  elder  Carlyles  remained  until  the  end  of  their  lives, 
and  their  youngest  son  lived  after  their  death.  On  this 
farm  Carlyle  spent  the  summer  of  1826,  with  his  loved 
kindred  about  him,  for  the  last  time. 

There  never  was  a  more  pitiful  tragedy  than  this  mar- 
riage. Repeatedly  Carlyle  offered  to  give  Miss  Welsh 
up,  and  as  often  she  declined  to  break  the  engagement, 
though  her  lover' s  poverty,  his  infirmity  of  temper  and 
ill-health  were  causes  enough.  Miss  Welsh  was  the 
only  child  of  a  widowed  mother,  and  had  been  accus- 
tomed to  luxury  and  the  best  society  where  she  lived. 
She  admitted,  years  after,  that  she  married  her  husband 
for  ambition,  and  that  her  life  had  been  made  miser- 
able.    Many  i)lans  were  made  before  a  final  one  was 


492  •  THE   MOTHER   OF   CARLYLE. 

reached.  Mrs.  Welsh  wished  the  married  couiDle  to 
live  with  her,  and  the  iDroposition  which  greatly 
pleased  her  daughter  was  received  with  harshness  by 
Carlyle,  who  announced  that  he  would  live  in  no 
house  that  he  was  not  the  head  of.  His  objections 
to  the  plan  he  summed  up  in  a  word,  ' '  The  man 
should  bear  rule  in  the  house,  and  not  the  woman." 
He  would  not  consent  to  live  with  her  mother,  who  had 
a  comfortable  home,  but  he  asked  Miss  Welsh  to 
marry  him  and  live  on  his  father's  farm  with  him, 
where  he  certainly  was  not  the  head  of  the  house. 
Miss  Welsh  acted  through  this  difficult  emergency 
with  great  self-control  and  dignity.  She  withheld 
from  her  mother  the  evidences  of  extreme  selfishness 
which  her  future  husband  manifested,  and  j)ersuaded 
her  to  consent  to  give  uj)  housekeeping  and  go  to 
live  with  her  father,  whose  home  was  about  fifteen 
miles  from  Scotsbrig— the  Carlyle  farm.  Miss  W^elsh 
fondly  hoped  that  her  mother  could  visit  her,  and  she 
so  suggested  to  Carlyle.     He  replied  in  these  words  : 

"  You  have  misconceived  the  condition  of  Scotsbrig  and  our  only 
possible  means  of  existence  there.  You  talk  of  your  mother  visiting 
us.  By  day  aad  night  it  would  astonish  her  to  see  this  household. 
Oh,  no.  Your  mother  must  not  visit  mine.  What  good  were  it  ? 
By  an  utmost  exertion  on  the  part  of  both  they  might  learn,  perhaps, 
to  tolerate  each  other,  more  probably  to  pity  and  partially  dislike 
each  other.  Better  than  mutual  tolerance  I  could  anticipate  nothing 
from  them.  The  mere  idea  of  such  a  visit  argued  too  plaiinly  that 
you  hneio  nothing  of  the  family  circle  in  which,  for  my  sake,  you  were 
ready  to  take  a  place." 

But  the  torture  of  being  so  near  and  yet  wholly 
separated  from  her  mother  was  sjjared  her.     Carlyle' s 


CARLYLE'S   OBTUSENESS.  493 

parents  both  objected  to  the  ijlan,  and  insisted  that  a 
farm-house  was  no  place  for  a  lady  brought  up  as  she 
had  been.  Their  sensible  conclusion  settled  the  matter, 
and  it  was  given  up.  Carlyle  was  as  much  mistaken  m 
Mrs.  Welsh  as  sons-in-law  very  often  are.  He  did  not 
know  her,  and  his  remarks  were  cruelly  unkind.  As 
a  matter  of  fact,  the  two  mothers  when  they  did  meet 
became  good  friends,  and  thoroughly  respected  each 
other.  Wise  as  he  was,  he  did  not  know  and  could  not 
understand  the  natural  feelings  of  a  mother.  His 
perception  of  woman  nature  was  defective,  then  as 
always.  He  did  not  at  all  comprehend  the  woman  he 
was  making  unhappy  by  his  want  of  tact  and  his 
ignorance  of  common  things.  He  proposed  one  plan 
after  another,  and  got  angry  with  her  because  she  flatly 
refused  to  have  her  mother  leave  her  house  and  let  him 
come  into  it  as  master.  The  mother  and  daughter, 
more  practical  and  self-denying  than  he,  broke  up  theii' 
home  at  Haddington,  where  they  had  lived  for  twenty 
years,  and  moved  to  Edinburgh,  where  they  rented  a 
cottage  in  the  suburbs  of  the  city.  Mrs.  Welsh  fur- 
nished it  handsomely,  and  paid  the  rent  and  remained 
there  with  her  daughter  until  the  marriage  took  place, 
when  she  left  it. 

Carlyle  had  said,  in  one  of  his  letters  to  Miss  Welsh, 
that  "it  is  not  nature  that  made  men  unhappy,  but 
their  own  despicable  perversities."  It  was  his '' des- 
picable perversity,"  in  this  as  in  many  another  matter, 
which  made  Mrs.  Carlyle,  after  forty  years  of  life  with 
him,  say  to  her  young  friends,  as  the  sad  lesson  of  her 
own  experience,  "  My  dear,  whatever  you  do,  never 
maiTy  a  man  of  genius." 


494  THE  MOTHER  OF  CARLYLE. 

He  assured  her  at  the  time  that  "  it  was  not  himself, 
but  the  devil  speaking  out  of  him,  which  could  utter 
one  harsh  word  to  a  heart  that  so  little  deserves  it." 

Carlyle's  last  letter  to  her  before  their  marriage  con- 
tained this  allusion  to  his  mother  : 

"  My  mother's  prayers  (to  speak  with  all  seriousness)  are,  I  do 
believe,  not  wanting  either  to  you  or  to  me,  and  if  the  sincere  wishes 
of  a  true  soul  can  have  any  virtue,  we  shall  not  want  a  blessing.  She 
bids  me  send  you  the  kindest  message  I  can  contrive,  which  I  send 
by  itself  without  contrivance.  She  says  she  will  have  one  good  greet 
when  we  set  off,  and  then  be  at  peace." 

Soon  after  he  was  settled  at  Comely  Bank  he  wrote 
his  mother  that  the  house  was  a  perfect  model,  fur- 
nished with  every  accommodation  that  heart  could  de- 
sire, and  that  his  wife  was  far  better  than  any  wife,  and 
loved  him  with  a  devotedness  which  it  was  a  mys- 
tery to  him  how  he  ever  deserved.  She,  always 
kind  and  thoughtful,  sent  the  young  housekeepers 
table  sujDplies,  and  Mrs.  Welsh  sent  them  a  present  of 
sixty  pounds,  which  Carlyle  refused  to  accept.  The 
wife,  in  a  letter  to  her  mother-in-law,  says  :  "  And 
now  let  me  thank  you  for  the  nice  eggs  and  butter, 
which  arrived  in  best  preservation  and  so  opportunely, 
just  as  I  was  lamenting  over  the  emptied  cans  as  one 
who  had  no  hope.  Really,  it  is  most  kind  in  you  to  be 
so  mindful  and  helpful  of  our  town  wants,  and  most 
gratifying  to  us  to  see  ourselves  so  cared  for." 

Mrs,  Carlyle's  insight,  as  Froude  has  said,  "  was  like 
witchcraft ;"  she  knew  intuitively  what  was  wanting  to 
be  done,  and  how  to  do  it.  She  kept  Carlyle  in  good 
humor,  a  task  of  itself,  entertained  their  many  friends, 


AT   CRAIGENPUTTOCK.  495 

and  managed  witli  one  servant  to  have  one  of  the  tidiest 
and  most  comfortable  of  homes,  on  the  small  amount 
of  money  Carlyle  gave  her  to  spend.  The  two  years 
spent  at  Comely  Bank  were  the  happiest  of  Mrs. 
Carlyle's  life.  She  was  troubled  about  Carlyle' s 
future,  for  they  were  spending  their  small  fortune, 
and  he  was  unoccupied,  or  rather  was  unprofitably  occu^ 
pied.  He  wrote  a  novel,  which  no  publisher  would 
accept,  and  was  well-nigh  discouraged  over  his  failure 
to  find  an  avenue  to  the  j)ublic  through  which  he  might 
sustain  himself  creditably.  Always  fond  of  a  country 
life,  because  of  its  freedom  and  its  solitude,  he  began  to 
look  about  him  for  a  home  less  expensive  than  the 
little  cottage  they  occupied.  Naturally  he  thought  of 
Annandale,  and  as  naturally  associated  his  brother 
with  his  future.  This  brother,  Aleck,  and  his  sister 
Mary  took  charge  "of  Craigenputtock  when  he  had  made 
up  his  mind  to  take  it,  and  thither  he  proposed  to  re- 
move at  once.  Craigenputtock,  now  associated  with 
Carlyle's  name  forever,  belonged  to  Mrs.  Welsh,  and 
so  pleased  was  she  with  the  proposed  plan  that  would 
bring  her  daughter  to  within  fifteen  miles  of  her,  that 
she  wrote  at  once  offering  to  put  the  place  in  order  at 
her  own  expense.  She  was  glad  to  have  the  Carlyles 
as  tenants,  and  gratified  to  have  it  in  her  power  to  make 
the  family  happy.  The  farm  itself  was  sixteen  miles 
from  the  nearest  town  and  nearest  doctor,  and  cut  off 
from  the  outer  world  in  winter  months  by  snow  and 
flood.*     Carlyle  expected  to  go  there  shortly  after  his 

*  Mrs.  Carlyle,  thirty  years  after  this  time,  wrote  to  a  friend  regard- 
ing her  life  at  Craigenputtock,  and  spoke  of  it  as  an  uncongenial  ex- 


496  THE  MOTHER  OF  CARLYLE. 

brother  and  sister  did,  but  unexpectedly  he  was  called 
upon  to  write  an  article,  and  then  several  for  the  maga- 
zines, and  he  was  detained  for  some  months.  Mean- 
while the  long-talked- of  visit  of  Mrs.  Carlyle  to  Edin- 
burgh was  made.  She  had  never  been  beyond  Annan- 
dale,  and  in  all  her  life  had  not  been  inside  of  any 
dwelling  other  than  a  farmhouse.  Her  visit  extended 
over  a  month,  and  was  in  some  respects  the  event  of  her 
life.  Carlyle\s  father  never  went  to  Edinburgh,  al- 
though he  had  been  urged  to  do  so.  Mrs.  Carlyle  was 
accompanied  by  her  daughter  Jean.  Carlyle  was  to 
have  met  them  at  the  station,  but  was  sick  in  bed,  and 
the  trusted  friend  who  was  sent  as  a  substitute  waited 
at  the  wrong  place.  He  tells  his  father,  in  a  letter 
announcing  their  arrival : 

"  Our  beloved  pilgrims  were  left  to  their  own  resources,  and  had 
to  pilot  their  way  hither  under  the  guidance  of  the  porter  who  carried 
their  box.  This,  however,  they  accomplished  without  difficulty  or 
accident,  and  rejoiced  us  all  by  their  safe  aad,  in  part  at  k-ast,  unex- 
pected arrival. 

"  Since  then  all  things  have  gone  on  prosperously.  Jane  has  been 
busy,  and  still  is  so,  getting  ready  suitable  apparel  of  bonnets  and 
frocks.  My  mother  has  heard  Andrew  Thomson  in  his  '  braw  kirk,' 
not  much  to  her  satisfaction,  since  '  he  had  to  light  four  candles 
before  even  he  could  strike.'  She  has  also  seen  old  Mrs.  Hope,  the 
Castle  of  Edinburgh,  the  Martyrs'  Graves,  John  Knox's  house,  and 
who  knows  how  many  other  wonders,  of  which  I  doubt  not  she  will 
give  you  a  true  and  full  description  when  she  returns.  As  yet,  how- 
ever, the  half  has  not  been  seen.  The  weather  has  been  so  stormy 
that  travelling  out  was  difficult,  and  I  have  been  in  no  high  condition 
for  officiating  as  guide.     In  stormy  days  she  smohes  along  with  me, 

istence  at  that  "  savage  place,  where  my  two  immediate  predecessors 
had  gone  mad,  and  the  third  had  taken  to  drink." 


MRS.    CARLYLE   AT   EDINBURGH.  497 

or  sews  wearing  raiment,  or  reads  the  wonderful  articles  of  my  writ- 
ing in  the  Edinburgh  Review.  She  has  also  had  a  glimpse  of  Francis 
Jeffrey,  the  great  critic  and  advocate,  and  a  shake  of  the  hand  from 
a  true  German  doctor. 

"  Nevertheless  she  is  extremely  anxious  about  getting  home,  and 
indeed  fails  no  day  to  tell  us  several  times  that  she  ought  to  be  off. 
'  She  is  doing  nothing,'  she  says  ;  '  and  they'll  a'  be  in  a  bubble  o' 
work  '  at  home.  I  tell  her  she  was  never  idle  for  two  weeks  in  her 
life  before,  and  ought  therefore  to  give  it  a  fair  trial  ;  that  '  the 
bubble  at  home  '  will  all  go  on  rightly  enough  in  her  absence  ;  that, 
in  short,  she  should  not  go  this  year,  but  the  next.  So  I  am  in  hopes 
we  shall  get  her  persuaded  to  stay  where  she  is  till  after  New  Year's 
day,  which  is  now  only  nine  or  ten  days  distant,  and  then  we  will  let 
her  go  in  peace.  The  two  Janes  and  she  are  all  out  in  the  town  at 
present  buying  muslin  for  sundry  necessary  articles  of  dress  which 
we  have  persuaded  the  mother  to  undertake  the  wearing  of.  These 
may  keep  her,  I  hope,  in  some  sort  of  occupation  ;  for  idle,  I  see,  she 
cannot  and  will  not  be.     "We  will  warn  you  duly  when  to  expect  her. 

"  I  trust  you  will  soon  be  well  enough  for  a  journey  hither  ;  for 
you  too,  my  dear  father,  must  see  Edinburgh  before  we  leave  it.  I 
have  thought  of  compelling  you  to  come  back  with  me  when  I  come 
down.  I  am  ever,  your  affectionate  son, 

"  T.  Carltle." 

Describing  her  visit  to  his  brother  John,  he  says  : 

"  I  had  her  at  the  pier  of  Leith,  and  showed  her  where  your  ship 
vanished,  and  she  looked  over  the  blue  waters  eastward  with  wettish 
eyes,  and  asked  the  dumb  waters  'when  he  would  be  back  again.' 
Good  mother  !  but  the  time  of  her  departure  came  on,  and  she  left 
us  stupefied  by  the  magnitude  of  such  an  enterprise  as  riding  over 
eighty  miles  in  the  Sir  Walter  Scott  without  jumping  out  of  the 
window,  which  I  told  her  was  the  problem.  Dear  mother  !  let  us 
thank  God  that  she  is  still  here  in  the  earth  spared  for  us,  and  I  hope, 
to  see  good.  I  would  not  exchange  her  for  any  ten  mothers  I  have 
ever  seen.  Jane  (Jean)  the  less  she  left  behind  her,  '  to  improve  her 
mind.'     The  creature  seems  to  be  doing  very  fairly,  and  is  well  and 


498  THE  MOTHER  OF  CARLYLE. 

contented.  My  Jane,  T  grieve  to  say,  is  yet  far  enough  from  well, 
l)ut  I  hope  much  from  summer  weather  and  a  smart  pony  in  the 
south.  She  is  not  by  any  means  an  established  valetudinarian,  yet 
she  seldom  has  a  day  of  true  health,  and  has  not  gained  strength 
entirely  since  you  left  her." 

The  statement  made  at  tlie  close  of  this  letter  regard- 
ing Mrs.  Carlyle's  health  was  often  reiterated  during 
the  Craigenputtock  time.  The  mother  of  Carlyle 
watched  her  from  Scotsbrig  with  anxious  fear.  She 
had  said  that  her  son  was  "  gQj  ill  to  liv^e  with,"  and 
she  feared  for  the  hapjDiness  of  his  wife.  Mrs.  Welsh, 
nearer  to  her  daughter  than  Mrs.  Carlyle,  knew  of  her 
lonely  and  hard  condition,  and  yet  could  not  alleviate 
it.  When  she  was  ill  she  would  go  to  her,  but  rarely 
otherwise.  Carlyle  wished  to  be  alone,  and  his  wife 
lived  in  isolation  that  he  might  work. 

The  eldest  daughter  of  Mrs.  Carlyle,  Margaret,  died 
during  this  time,  and  her  husband's  health  shortly 
afterward  failed.  She  never  went  away  from  Scotsbrig 
after  the  death  of  her  husband  except  to  visit  Craigen- 
23uttock.  Carlyle  was  not  happy  away  from  her  a  great 
while  at  a  time  ;  he  visited  her  frequently,  and  showed 
her  on  all  occasions  his  real  heart.  She  insisted  upon 
being  kept  informed  of  the  smallest  incidents  connected 
with  his  life.  He  wrote  her  from  Edinburgh,  where 
he  was  the  winter  after  his  father  died,  in  this  strain  : 
"  Meanwhile,  my  dear  mother,  I  beg  you  again  and 
again  to  take  care  of  yourself  ;  especially  in  this  wild, 
gusty  February  weather.  Consider  your  welfare  not 
as  your  own,  but  as  that  of  others,  to  whom  it  is  pre- 
cious beyond  price.  I  hope  they  are  all  kind,  submis- 
sive, and  helpful  to  you  ;  it  well  beseems  them  and 


LETTER  FROM  CARLYLE,  499 

me."  Carlyle  told  lier  of  his  articles  that  he  was  writ- 
ing, of  the  people  he  met,  -and  the  i)laces  he  had  been 
to,  and  closed  his  letters  with  urgent  appeals  to  her  to 
be  comforted  and  contented  and  to  care  for  her  health. 
One  of  the  last  letters  written  his  mother  by  Carlyle 
from  Craigenputtock  is  this  one,  quoted  in  part,  invit- 
ing her  to  visit  them,  and  making  reference  to  his 
bu'thday  : 

"  But  there  is  another  expedition,  my  dear  mother,  to  which  you 
are  bound,  which  I  hope  you  are  getting  ready  for.  Come  up  with 
Austin  and  Mary  to  Jean  ;  stay  with  her  till  you  rest,  sending  me  up 
word  when ;  on  Wednesday  or  any  other  day  I  will  come  driving 
down  and  fetch  you.  In  about  a  week  hence,  as  I  calculate,  I  shall  be 
done  with  this  scribblement,  and  then  we  can  read  together  and  talk 
together  and  walk  together.  Besides,  this,  in  the  horrid  winter 
weather,  is  a  better  lodging  for  you  than  any  other,  and  we  will  take 
better  care  of  you — we  promise.  The  blue  room  shall  be  dry  as  fire 
can  make  it  ;  no  such  drying,  except  those  you  make  at  Scotsbrig, 
where  on  one  occasion,  as  I  remember,  you  spent  the  whole  time  of 
my  visit  in  drying  my  clothes.  Lastly,  that  when  '  you  come  you 
may  come. '  Jane  bids  me  communicate  to  Jamie  that  she  wants  three 
stone  of  meal,  but  will  not  take  it  unless  he  take  pay  for  it. 

' '  And  so,  dear  mother,  this  scribble  must  end,  as  others  have 
done.  To-morrow,  I  believe,  is  my  eight  and  thirtieth  birthday  ! 
You  were  then  young  in  life  :  I  had  not  yet  entered  it.  Since  then 
— how  much  !  how  much  !  They  are  in  the  land  of  silence  (but, 
while  we  live,  not  of  forgetfulness  !)  whom  we  once  knew,  and,  often 
with  thoughts  too  deep  for  words,  wistfully  ask  of  their  and  our 
Father  above  that  we  may  again  know.  God  is  great  ;  God  is  good  ! 
It  is  written,  '  He  will  wipe  away  all  tears  from  every  eye.'  Be  it  as 
He  wills,  not  as  we  wish.  These  things  continually  almost  dwell 
with  me,  loved  figures  hovering  in  the  background  or  foreground  of 
my  mind.  A  few  years  more  and  we  too  shall  be  with  them  in  eter- 
nity. Meanwhile  it  is  this  Time  that  is  ours  :  let  us  be  busy  with  it 
and  work,  work,  for  the  night  cometli. 


500  THE   MOTHER   OF   CARLYLE 

"  I  send  you  all,  young  and  old,  my  heart's  blessing,  and  remain 
as  ever,  my  dear  mother,  Your  affectionate 

"  T.  Carltle.'^ 

Finally,  when  it  was  decided  to  leave  the  lonely 
country  place  on  the  Dumfriesshire  moors  and  go  to 
London,  "  burning  their  ships  behind  them,"  as  Mrs. 
Carlyle  said,  Carlyle  wrote  his  brother  that  the  news 
of  their  determination  would  be  a  heavy  stroke  for  his 
mother,  and  added  : 

"  My  brother  and  she  are  the  only  ties  I  have  to  Scotland.  I  will 
tell  her  that,  though  at  a  greater  distance,  we  are  not  to  be  dis- 
united. Regular  letters — frequent  visits.  I  will  say,  who  knows  but 
wiiat  you  and  I  may  yet  bring  her  up  to  London  to  pass  her  old  days, 
waited  on  by  both  of  us  ?  Go  whither  she  may,  she  will  have  her 
Bible  with  her  and  her  faith  in  God.  She  is  the  truest  Christian 
believer  I  have  ever  met  with  ;  nay,  I  might  almost  say  the  only 
true  one." 

While  he  thought  constantly  of  his  mother,  who  was 
near  him  though  not  with  him,  he  failed  to  realize  that 
his  wife  was  failing  steadily  in  health.  Truly  had  she 
said  in  a  letter  to  her  brother-in-law  :  "I  almost  wish 
that  T  felt  more  anxiety  about  our  future  ;  for  this 
composure  is  not  courage^  but  diseased  indifference. 
...  It  seems  as  if  the  problem  of  living  would  be 
immensely  simplified  to  me  if  I  had  health.  It  does 
require  such  an  effort  to  keep  one' s  self  from  growing 
quite  wicked,  while  that  weary  weaver's  shuttle  is  ply- 
ing between  my  temples."  The  six  years'  imprison- 
ment for  her  was  at  an  end,  but  hers  was  a  shattered 
constitution,  and  strange  it  was  that  her  husband  was 
so  utterly  blind  to  her  condition  when  he  was  so  care- 
ful of  his  mother's  health.     He  wrote  incessantly  to  the 


PARTING   WITH   HIS  MOTHER.  501 

latter  and  of  her  to  liis  brothers,  and  was  a  son  whose 
devotion  has  never  been  excelled. 

When  he  bade  her  good-by,  in  leaving  Scotland  for 
London,  it  was  with  more  grief  than  he  had  ever  felt 
in  jDarting  with  her  before,  because  of  the  distance  that 
would  be  between  them.     He  wrote  his  brother  John  : 

"  With  regard  to  our  dear  mother,  I  bid  you  comfort  yourself  with 
the  assurance  that  she  is  moderately  well.  She  adjusts  herself  with 
the  old  heroism  to  the  new  circumstances  ;  agrees  that  I  must  come 
hither  ;  parts  from  me  with  the  stillest  face,  more  touching  than  if 
it  had  been  all  beteared.  I  said  to  Alick,  as  we  drove  up  the  Pur- 
damstdwn  brae  that  morning,  that  I  thought,  if  I  had  all  the 
mothers  I  ever  saw  to  choose  from,  I  would  have  chosen  my  own. 
She  is  to  have  Harry,*  and  can  ride  very  well  on  him,  will  go  down 
a  while  to  sea-bathing  at  Mary's,  and  will  spend  the  summer  tolerably 
enough.  For  winter  I  left  her  the  task  of  spinning  me  a  plaid  dress- 
ing-gown, with  which,  if  she  get  too  soon  done,  she  may  spin  another 
for  you.  She  has  books,  above  all  her  Booh.  She  trusts  in  God,  and 
shall  not  be  put  to  shame.  While  she  was  at  Craigenputtock  I  made 
her  train  me  to  two  song-tunes  ;  and  we  often  sang  them  together, 
and  tried  them  often  again  in  coming  down  into  Annandale.  One  of 
them  I  actually  found  myself  humming  with  a  strange  cheerfully 
pathetic  feeling  when  I  first  came  in  sight  of  huge  smoky  Babylon — 

'  For  there's  seven  foresters  in  yon  forest, 
And  them  I  want  to  see,  see, 
And  them  I  want  to  see.' 

I  wrote  her  a  little  note  yesterday,  and  told  her  this." 

The  wife  followed  her  husband  shortly  afterward,  and 
the  old  mother,  brave  to  the  last,  accompanied  her  to 
Annan,  and  stood  on  the  pier  waving  her  handkerchief 
so  long  as  the  vessel  was  in  sight.  So  soon  as  the  pair 
were  settled  in  their  now  historic  home   in   Cheyne 

*  Mrs.  Carlyle's  pony. 


503  THE   MOTHER  OF   CARLYLE. 

Row,  Carlyle  wrote  the  minutest  description  of  it  to 
his  mother,  who  was  curious  about  the  details.  The 
mother  was  most  kind  to  Mrs.  Carlyle  in  those  last 
days  at  Craigenputtock.  The  latter  tells  a  part  of  her 
goodness  in  a  letter  she  sent  her  from  London.  She 
says  : 

"  My  dear  Mother  :  Could  I  have  supposed  it  possible  that  any 
mortal  was  so  stupid  as  not  to  feel  disappointed  in  receiving  a  letter 
from  me  instead  of  my  husband,  I  should  have  written  to  you  very 
long  ago.  But  while  this  humility  becomes  me,  it  is  also  my  duty 
(too  long  neglected)  to  send  a  little  adjunct  to  my  husband's  letters, 
just  to  assure  you  '  with  my  own  hand  '  that  I  continue  to  love  you 
amid  the  hubbub  of  this  '  noble  city  '  just  the  same  as  in  the  quiet  of 
Craigenputtock,  and  to  cherish  a  grateful  recollection  of  your  many 
kindnesses  to  me  ;  especially  of  that  magnanimous  purpose  to  '  sit  at 
my  bedside  '  through  the  night  preceding  my  departure,  '  that  I 
might  be  sure  to  sleep.'  I  certainly  shall  never  forget  that  night, 
and  the  several  preceding  and  following  :  but  for  the  kindness  and 
helpfulness  shown  me  on  all  hands  I  must  have  traiked  (perished), 
one  would  suppose.  I  had  every  reason  to  be  thankful  then  to  Prov- 
idence and  my  friends,  and  I  have  had  the  same  reason  since." 

Life  in  London  was  begun,  and  Carlyle' s  fierce 
apprenticeship  was  nearly  over.  He  found  his  place 
and  filled  it,  and  long  before  his  mother  died  she  knew 
that  her  eldest  born  had  become  a  great  man.  She 
had  followed  him  from  his  first  effort  at  writing, 
studying  what  he  wrote,  and  learning  what  she  could 
of  the  subjects  that  interested  him.  President  McCosh, 
of  Princeton,  in  wTiting  of  Carlyle,  says  that  his  mother 
caused  him  to  write  his  Life  of  Cromwell.  He  says 
Carlyle  gave  this  account  of  it : 

"  My  mither  ay  argued  that  one  who  prayed  as  Cromwell  did  must 
have  been  a  gude  man.     But  whan  I  began  to  inquire  what  ithers 


DEATH   OF   MRS.    CARLYLE.  503 

thocht  of  him,  I  fand  everybody  against  him.  The  Tories,  of  coorse, 
hated  him,  as  he  had  upturned  settled  government.  Even  the 
Whigs  were  against  him,  as  he  carried  things  too  far.  We  could  not 
expect  churchmen  to  like  a  leader  of  the  sectaries.  Even  dissenters 
were  afraid  to  stand  by  him.  They  have  heaped  filth  on  him,  heap 
upon  heap,  thirty  feet  high.  But  I  determined  to  go  through  it  a", 
and  as  I  dug  I  came  upon  him  and  found  there  the  face  of  a  man.  I 
have  shown  that  my  mither  was  richt  and  the  haill  warld  wrang." 

Mrs.  Carlyle  was  a  religious  woman  of  honest  and 
unchanging  faith,  but  she  lacked  the  softening  grace 
that  belonged  to  her  daughter-in-law,  and  to  Mrs. 
Welsh,  the  latter 's  mother.  Carlyle,  in  speaking  of  his 
wife' s  refinement,  after  her  death  remarks  upon  the  dif- 
ference between  his  mother  and  her,  and  says  :  "  Did  I 
elsewhere  meet  in  the  world  a  soul  so  direct  from  the 
Empyrean  ?  My  dear  old  mother  was  perhaps  equally 
pious,  in  the  Roman  sense  ;  in  the  British  she  was  much 
more  so  ;  but  starry  flashes  of  this  kind  she  had  not — 
from  her  education  she  could  not."  The  good  old 
mother  who  had  been  so  much  to  her  son  died  in  1853, 
and  the  event  is  thus  i)ictured  by  that  son  : 

"  Never  was  a  more  perfect  politeness  of  heart,  beautifully  shining 
through  its  naive  bits  of  embarrassments  and  simple  peasant  forms. 
A  pious  mother,  if  there  ever  was  one  :  pious  to  God  the  Maker  and 
to  all  He  had  made.  Intellect,  humor,  softest  pity,  love,  and,  before 
all,  perfect  veracity  in  thought,  in  word,  mind,  and  action  ;  these 
were  her  characteristics,  and  had  been  now  for  above  eighty-three 
years,  in  a  humbly  diligent,  beneficent,  and  often  toilsome  and  suffer- 
ing life,  which  right  surely  had  not  been  in  vain  for  herself  or  others. 
The  end  was  now  evidently  nigh,  nor  could  we  even  wish,  on 
those  terms,  much  longer.  Her  state  of  utter  feebleness  and  totally 
ruined  health  last  year  (1852)  had  been  tragically  plain  to  me  on  leav- 
ing for  Germany.  For  the  first  time  even  my  presence  could  give  no 
pleasure,  her  head  now  so  heavy. 


504  THE   MOTHER   OF   CARLYLE. 

"  Friday  morning,  December  23d,  1853,  got  to  the  Kirtlebridge 
Station  ;  a  gray  dreary  element,  cold,  dim,  and  sorrowful  to  eye  and 
to  soul.  Earth  spotted  with  frozen  snow  on  the  thaw  as  I  walked 
solitary  tlie  two  miles  to  Scotsbrig  ;  my  own  thought  and  question, 
will  the  departing  still  be  there  ?  Vivid  are  my  recollections  there  ; 
painful  still  and  mournful  exceedingly  ;  but  I  need  not  record  them. 
3Iy  poor  old  mother  still  knew  me  (or  at  times  only  half  knew  me)  ; 
had  no  disease,  but  much  misery;  was  sunk  in  weakness,  weariness, 
and  pain.  She  resembled  her  old  self,  thought  I,  as  the  last  depart- 
ing moon-sickle  does  the  moon  itself,  about  to  vanish  in  the  dark 
waters.  Sad,  infinitely  sad,  if  also  sublime.  ...  At  midnight  were 
her  last  words  to  me,  tone  almost  kinder  than  usual,  and  as  if  to 
make  amends,  '  Good-night,  and  thank  ye  ! '  John  had  given  her 
some  drops  of  laudanum.  In  about  an  hour  after  she  fell  asleep,  and 
spoke  or  awoke  no  more.  All  Sunday  she  laj'^  sleeping,  strongly 
breathing,  face  grand  and  statue-like  ;  about  4  p.m.  the  breath,  with- 
out a  struggle,  scarcely  with  abatement  for  some  seconds,  fled  away 
whence  it  had  come.  Sunday,  Christmas  Day,  1853.  My  age  fifty- 
eight  ;  hers  eighty-three. " 

Afterward,  in  writing  on  the  subject  of  her  going 
from  him.  he  used  these  words  : 

"  A  mother  dead  ;  it  is  an  epoch  for  us  all  ;  and  to  each  one  of  us 
it  comes  with  a  pungency  as  if  peculiar,  a  look  as  of  originality  and 
singularity." 

After  the  mother  was  gone,  Carlyle's  visits  to  Scot- 
land became  rarer.  His  brothers  and  sisters  were 
married,  and  they  did  not  need  him  as  in  the  old 
days.  His  fame  too  had  grown,  and  he  was  living  a 
busy  life  in  London,  where  he  continued  to  reside. 
His  wife's  healtli  failed  rapidly  the  last  years  of  her 
life,  and  in  1868  she  died.  Carlyle  realized  that  she 
w^as  ill,  but  her  death  was  to  him  ''like  a  thunder- 
bolt from  skies  all  blue."     She  died  suddenly  while 


CARLYLE'S   REMORSE.  505 

riding  alone  in  Hyde  Park.  The  coachman  noticed 
that  the  occupant  of  the  carriage  was  strangely  silent, 
and  after  looking  through  the  glass  and  seeing  her  sit- 
ting in  the  same  position  he  accosted  a  passer-by,  who 
confirmed  his  fears.  She  was  leaning  back  in.  one  cor- 
ner of  the  carriage,  dead. 

After  her  death  Carlyle  suffered  acute  remorse,  and 
presented  a  most  pathetic  picture,  sitting  alone  in  his 
darkened  house,  recalling  her  sacrifices  and  sufferings, 
and  trying  by  acknowledgments  and  rejientance  to 
make  atonement  to  her.  He  as  freely  condemned  him- 
self as  a  wholly  honest  and  now  wholly  undeceived 
man  could.  All  her  letters  he  obtained,  and  carefully 
went  over  them,  annotating  them,  omitting  nothing, 
however  severely  it  might  reflect  upon  himself.  He 
had  greatly  sinned  against  her  in  his  blindness,  but 
when  the  bitter  truth  became  clear,  he  braved  the  cen- 
sure of  the  world,  which  had  crowned  him  the  Sage  of 
Chelsea,  and  humbled  himself  in  the  dust. 

Mrs.  Carlyle  was  a  radiant,  gracious  woman,  born  to 
love  and  be  loved,  and  her  life  as  Carlyle' s  wife  was  a 
mistake,  since  it  resulted  in  heart-break  for  her.  She 
made  the  sad  acknowledgment  that  she  was  "  sad  at 
times,  at  all  times  sad  as  death,  but  that  I  am  used  to, 
and  don't  mind  ;"  and  again  these  pathetic  words  to 
her  husband  were  wrung  from  her,  "  To  see  you  con- 
stantly discontented,  and  as  much  so  with  me,  appar- 
ently, as  with  all  other  things,  when  I  have  neither  the 
strength  nor  sjjirit  to  bear  up  against  your  discon- 
tent, nor  the  obtuseness  to  be  indifferent  to  it — that 
has  done  me  more  harm  than  you  have  the  least  notion 
of.     You   have  not   the  least  notion  what  a  killing 


506  THE   MOTHER   OF   CARLYLE. 

thought  it  is  to  have  put  into  one's  heart,  gnawing 
there  day  and  night,  that  one  ought  to  be  deacJ, 
since  one  can  no  longer  make  the  same  exertions  aw 
formerly  ;  that  one  was  taken  '  for  better,'  not  by 
any  means  '  for  worse  ;'  and  in  fact,  that  the  only 
feasible  and  dignified  thing  that  remains  for  one  to  do 
is  to  just  die,  and  be  done  with  it." 

Poor  Jeanie  Carlyle  !  who  had  been  the  idol  of  her 
father  and  her  mother,  the  beloved  of  Edward  Irving, 
the  admired  friend  of  Darwin,  Lord  Jeffrey,  and  Mill, 
the  prized  acquaintance  of  Tennyson,  De  Quincey, 
Mazzini,  Lady  Russell,  Brewster,  Sir  William  Hamil- 
ton, and  a  host  of  other  brilliant  men  and  women,  was 
an  unappreciated  wife,  and  a  miserable  one  for  many 
years.  Of  her  Leigh  Hunt  wrote  that  charming  little 
poem  entitled  "  Jenny  Kissed  Me." 

"  Jenny  kissed  me  when  we  met, 

Jumping  from  the  chair  she  sat  in  ; 
Time,  you  thief,  who  love  to  get 
Sweets  into  your  list,  put  that  in. 

"  Say  I'm  weary,  say  I'm  sad. 

Say  that  health  and  wealth  have  missed  me  ; 
Say  I'm  lonely,  dull,  but  add, 
Jenny  kissed  me." 

An  affectionate  heart  and  brilliant  intellect,  a  grace- 
ful and  pleasing  person  and  genial  manners  had  this 
woman,  whose  fame  is  inalienably  linked  with  the  best 
minds  of  the  England  of  her  day,  and  whose  personal- 
ity is  in  beautiful  contrast  to  that  of  her  husband. 


THE  MOTHER  AND  WIFE  OF  DR.  JOHNSON. 

The  mother  of  Samuel  Johnson  "  the  G-reat,"  as  he 
deserves  to  be  called  in  distinction  from  all  others  of 
his  name,  we  can  know  but  incidentally  through  her 
son.  He  was  born  in  Lichfield,  on  the  18th  of  Sep- 
tember, 1709.  His  father,  Michael  Johnson,  w^as  a 
bookseller,  highly  respected  by  the  clergy  of  the 
cathedral  and  his  fellow-townsmen.  For  a  time  he 
was  one  of  the  magistrates  of  Lichfield,  and  in  the  year 
of  his  son's  birth  he  was  sheriff  of  the  county  of 
Stafford.  He  was  a  High  Churchman  and  a  Tory,  and 
reconciled  himself  with  difficulty  to  taking  the  oaths 
to  the  reigning  dynasty.  He  was  a  man  of  consider- 
able mental  and  physical  power,  but  tormented  by 
hypochondriacal  tendencies,  which  were  afterward 
more  painfully  developed  in  his  son. 

Johnson  left  school  at  sixteen,  and  spent  two  years 
at  home,  probably  assisting  his  father  in  the  book- 
store, or  shop,  as  it  would  be  called  in  England.  He 
now  began  to  feel  the  pressure  of  poverty.  His 
father's  affairs  were  getting  into  disorder.  He  opened 
book-stalls  at  Birmingham  and  Uttoxeter,  in  addition 
to  his  central  store  in  Lichfield.  One  day  the  elder 
Johnson,  who  was  confined  to  his  bed  by  illness, 
begged  his  son  to  take  his  place  and  sell  books  at  the 
stall  in  Uttoxeter.     Pride,  which  was  always  strong  in 


508  THE  MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF  DR.    JOHNSON. 

the  son's  character,  made  him  refuse.  Fifty  years 
afterward  Dr.  Johnson  was  staying  at  Lichfield,  in 
which  a  few  of  the  contemj)oraries  of  his  youth  still 
lived.  He  was  missing  one  morning  from  the  break- 
fast-table, and  did  not  return  until  supper-time. 
When  asked  where  he  had  been,  he  told  the  story  that 
fiity  years  before,  that  very  day,  he  had  been  guilty  of 
his  only  act  of  disobedience  to  his  father.  "To  do 
away  with  the  sin  of  this  disobedience,  I  this  day  went 
in  a  post-chaise  to  Uttoxeter,  and  going  into  the 
market  at  the  time  of  high  business,  uncovered  my 
head  and  stood  with  it  bare  an  hour  before  the  stall 
which  my  father  had  formerly  used,  exposed  to  the 
sneers  of  the  standers-by  and  the  inclemency  of  the 
weather,  a  penance  by  which  I  trust  I  have  propitiated 
Heaven  for  this  only  instance,  I  believe,  of  contumacy 
to  my  father." 

A  romantic  story  which  is  well  authenticated  is  told 
of  Michael  Johnson's  early  life,  before  he  married. 
While  he  was  serving  his  apprenticeship  at  Leek,  in 
Staffordshke,  a  young  woman  fell  passionately  in  love 
with  him.  Although  he  did  not  return  her  affection, 
she  followed  him  to  Lichfield,  where  he  had  settled  as 
a  bookseller  and  stationer,  and  took  lodgings  opposite 
to  the  house  in  which  he  stayed.  AVlien  told  that  the 
young  woman's  mind  was  beginning  to  give  way  under 
the  weight  of  this  unrequited  affection,  Michael 
Johnson  generously  went  to  her  and  made  her  an  offer 
of  his  hand.  But  it  was  too  late.  She  actually  died 
of  love.  She  was  buried  in  the  cathedral  of  Lichfield  ; 
and  he,  with  tender  regard,  placed  a  stone  over  her 
grave  with  this  inscription  : 


REMEMBRANCE   OF   HIS   MOTHER.  509 

here  lies  the  body  op 

Mrs.  Elizabeth  Blaney,  a  Stranger  : 

She  departed  this  life 

20th  of  September,  1694. 

In  the  days  of  Ms  jprosperity,  the  chaplain  of  Lord 
Gower  wrote  to  Michael  Johnson,  in  a  letter  dated 
''Trentham,  St.  Peter's  Day,  1716"  : 

"  Johnson,  the  Lichfield  librarian,  is  now  here  ;  he 
propagates  learning  all  over  this  diocese,  and 
advanceth  knowledge  to  its  just  height ;  all  the  clergy 
here  are  his  pupils,  and  suck  all  they  have  from  him." 
To  his  father  the  literary  proclivities  of  Samuel  John- 
son are  clearly  traceable.  His  mother,  although  not 
bookish,  was  sensible  and  pious,  and  of  excellent  judg- 
ment. One  of  Samuel  Johnson's  Lichfield  school- 
fellows being  asked  if  Mrs.  Johnson  was  not  proud  of 
her  son,  replied  that  "  she  had  too  much  good  sense  to 
be  vain,  but  she  knew  her  son's  value."  Johnson 
himself  once  mentioned  that  he  remembered  distinctly 
his  mother  telling  him,  when  he  was  a  little  child  in 
bed  with  her,  that  ' '  heaven  was  a  place  to  which  good 
people  went,  and  hell  a  place  to  which  bad  people 
went."  This  was  the  first  time,  he  says,  that  he  had 
ever  heard  of  either  j)lace,  and  to  imj)ress  the  informa- 
tion on  his  memory  his  mother  sent  him  to  repeat  it  to 
Thomas  Jackson,  their  man-servant.  Much  of  the 
strong  religious  faith  which  characterized  Dr.  Johnson 
in  after-life  may  have  originated  in  similar  teachings 
imparted  to  him  by  his  mother  as  he  nestled  in  her 
bosom  when  a  child. 

Although  both  his  father  and  his  mother  possessed 
sterling  qualities,   they  do  not  seem  to  have  lived  in 


510         THE  MOTHER  AND   WIFE  OF  DR.    JOHNSON. 

mucli  sympathy  with  each  other's  thoughts.  "My 
father  and  mother,"  he  says  himself,  "  had  not  much 
happiness  from  each  other.  They  seldom  conversed, 
for  mv  father  could  not  bear  to  talk  of  his  affairs  ;  and 
my  mother  being  unacquainted  with  books,  cared  not 
to  talk  of  anything  else.  Had  my  mother  been  more 
literate,  they  had  been  better  companions.  She  might 
have  sometimes  introduced  her  unwelcome  topic  with 
more  success,  if  she  could  have  diversified  her  conver- 
sation. Of  business  she  had  no  distinct  conception  ; 
and  therefore  her  discourse  was  composed  only  of  com- 
plaint, fear,  and  suspicion.  Neither  of  them  ever  tried 
to  calculate  the  i^rofits  of  trade  or  the  expenses  of  liv- 
ing. My  mother  concluded  that  we  were  poor,  because 
we  lost  by  some  of  our  trades  ;  but  the  truth  was  that 
my  father,  having  in  the  early  part  of  his  life  con- 
tracted debts,  never  had  trade  sufficient  to  enable  him. 
to  pay  them  and  to  maintain  his  family  ;  he  got  some- 
thing, but  not  enough.  It  was  not  till  about  1768  that 
I  thought  to  calculate  the  returns  of  my  father's  trade, 
and,  by  that  estimate,  his  probable  profits.  This  I  be- 
lieve my  parents  never  did." 

The  testimony  of  his  schoolfellow  that  his  mother 
"  knew  her  son's  value,"  added  to  his  own  testimony 
as  to  her  early  religious  teachings,  is  sufficient  proof 
that  the  mother,  not  less  than  the  father,  watched  her 
boy's  progress  at  the  different  schools  he  attended, 
with  parental  and  anxious  interest.  His  progress  more 
than  Justified  their  highest  anticipations.  The  first 
school  he  was  sent  to  was  what  was  called  in  England 
a  Dame  School,  because  its  teacher  was  a  woman.  A 
widow  named  Oliver  kept  this  particular  school.     A 


JOHNSON'S   TEACHERS.  511 

servant  used  to  take  the  little  boy  to  Dame  Oliver  s 
and  carry  Mm  home  again.  One  afternoon  the  servant 
did  not  reach  the  school  at  the  proper  time,  and  little 
Sam  set  out  on  his  homeward  'journey  alone.  It  was 
no  easy  road  for  him,  as  his  short-sightedness  com- 
pelled him  often  to  stoop  down  and  examine  any 
obstacle  before  he  stepped  over  it.  But  on  he  strode 
manfully  until,  happening  to  look  behind  him,  he  saw 
his  schoolmistress  following  him  at  a  respectful  dis- 
tance. This  seemed  to  him  so  derogatory  to  his 
powers  of  self-government  that  he  ran  back  and  beat 
her  with  his  little  fists.  One  can  well  believe  it,  as 
this  independent  spirit  and  self-reliance  was  his  char- 
acteristic through  life. 

His  next  teacher  was  a  master  whom  he  used 
familiarly  to  speak  of  as  Tom  Brown,  adding,  "He 
published  a  spelling-book,  and  dedicated  it  to  the  Uni- 
verse ;  but  I  fear  no  copy  of  it  can  now  be  had." 

He  began  the  study  of  Latin  with  Mr.  Hawkins,  the 
usher  of  Lichfield  Grammar  School,  a  man  whora  he 
describes  as  "very  skilful  in  his  little  way."  Two 
years  afterward  he  passed  into  the  hands  of  Mr.  Hun- 
ter, the  head-master,  who,  according  to  Johnson's  own 
account,  ' '  was  very  severe,  and  wrong-headedly  severe. 
He  used,"  said  he,  "  to  beat  us  unmercifully  ;  and  he 
did  not  distinguish  between  ignorance  and  negligence  ; 
for  he  would  beat  a  boy  equally  for  not  knowing  a 
thing  as  for  neglecting  to  know  it.  He  would  ask  a 
boy  a  question,  and  if  he  did  not  answer  it,  he  would 
beat  him,  without  considering  whether  he  had  an 
opportunity  of  knowing  how  to  answer  it.  For  in- 
stance, he  would  call  up  a  boy  and  ask  him  Latin  for 


512         THE  MOTHER  AND  WIFE  OF  DR.   JOHNSON. 

candlestick,  wliicli  the  boy  would  not  expect  to  be 
asked.  Now,  sir,  if  a  boy  could  answer  every  ques- 
tion, there  would  be  no  need  of  a  master  to  teach 
him."  But  Mr.  Hunter  was  a  good  Latin  scholar,  and 
Johnson  was  obliged  to  confess  that  his  severity  was 
useful  in  his  own  case.  "  My  master,"  he  says, 
"  whipped  me  very  well.  Without  that,  sir,  I  should 
have  done  nothing.''  With  every  stroke  of  the  rod, 
the  master  used  to  pronounce  the  solemn  benediction, 
"  Remember,  I  do  this  to  save  you  from  the  gallows." 
Mr.  Hunter  had  reason  to  be  proud  of  his  scholar,  for 
Johnson  was  the  undisputed  head  scholar  of  Lichfield 
Grammar  School.  His  schoolfellows  readily  acknowl- 
edged his  supremacy,  and  three  of  them  used  to  call 
for  him  every  morning  and  carry  him  to  school,  an 
onerous  performance,  considering  the  massiveness  of 
his  limbs  even  when  a  boy. 

We  do  not  know  what  Johnson's  mother  thought  of 
the  flagellations  inflicted  uj^on  him  by  his  school- 
master. Mothers  in  those  days  more  generally  ap- 
proved of  whippings  than  they  do  now,  when  appeals 
to  the  understanding  and  the  will-power  even  of  chil- 
dren have  been  found  to  be  "  a  more  excellent  way.'' 
But  that  she  attended  to  his  religious  instruction  ac- 
cording to  her  lights  is  attested  by  himself.  "  Sun- 
day," he  says,  "  was  a  heavy  day  to  me  when  I  w^as  a 
boy.  My  mother  confined  me  on  that  day,  and  made 
me  read  '  The  Whole  Duty  of  Man,'  from  a  great  part 
of  which  I  could  derive  no  instruction.  When,  for  in- 
stance, I  had  read  the  chapter  on  theft,  which  from  my 
infancy  I  had  been  taught  was  wrong,  I  was  no  more 
convinced  that  theft  was  wrong  than  before  ;  so  there 


HIS  EARLY  MAXIM.  513 

was  no  accession  of  knowledge."  He  further  adds, 
"  I  fell  into  dn  inattention  to  religion,  or  an  indifference 
about  it,  in  my  ninth  year.  The  church  at  Lichfield, 
in  which  we  had  a  seat,  wanted  reparation,  so  I  was  to 
go  and  find  a  seat  in  other  churches  ;  and  having  bad 
eyes,  and  being  awkward  about  this,  I  used  to  go  and 
read  in  the  fields  on  Sunday.  This  habit  continued 
till  my  fourteenth  year  ;  I  then  became  a  sort  of  lax 
talker  against  religion,  for  I  did  not  much  tMnk 
against  it."  The  truths  impressed  upon  him  by  his 
mother  no  doubt  kept  alive  the  spark  of  religion  in 
his  heart.  He  kept  his  little  diary  from  his  earliest 
years.  Deep  must  have  been  the  thoughts,  precocious 
the  learning,  and  strong  the  will  of  one  who,  when  a 
child  of  ten,  made  this  entry  in  it,  dated  October,  1719  : 
'■'■  Desidixe  naledlxi  ;  sirenis  istius  cantibus  surdam 
postJiac  aurem  ohversurusy  "  I  have  bidden  fare- 
well to  sloth,  and  intend  henceforth  to  turn  a  deaf  ear 
to  the  strains  of  that  siren." 

After  an  interval  spent  at  the  house  of  a  relative, 
Johnson  was,  at  the  age  of  fifteen,  sent  to  Stourbridge 
School,  in  Worcestershire.  The  master,  a  Mr.  Went- 
worth,  was,  he  says,  "a  very  able  man,  but  an  idle 
man,  and  to  me  very  severe  ;  but  I  cannot  blame  him 
much.  I  was  then  a  big  boy  ;  he  saw  I  did  not  rever- 
ence him,  and  that  he  could  get  no  honor  by  me.  I 
had  brought  enough  with  me  to  carry  me  through  ; 
and  all  I  should  get  at  his  school  would  be  ascribed  to 
my  own  labor,  or  to  my  former  master.  Yet  he  taught 
me  a  great  deal. "  Of  the  difference  in  the  sort  of  prog- 
ress he  made  in  the  two  schools  of  Lichfield  and 
Stourbridge  he  used  to  say  :  "  At  one,  I  learned  much 


514  THE   MOTHER   AND    WIFE   OF   DR.    JOHNSON. 

in  the  school,  but  little  from  the  master  ;  in  the  other 
I  learned  much  from  the  master,  but  little  in  the 
school." 
"Of  the  power  of  his  memory,"  writes  Boswell, 
' '  for  which  he  was  all  his  life  eminent  to  a  degree 
almost  incredible,  the  following  early  instance  was 
told  me  in  his  presence  at  Lichfield,  in  1776,  by  his 
stepdaughter,  Mrs.  Lucy  Porter,  as  related  to  her 
by  his  mother.  When  he  was  a  child  in  petticoats, 
and  had  learned  to  read,  Mrs.  Johnson  one  morning 
put  the  Common  Prayer-book  into  his  hands,  pointed 
to  the  collect  for  the  day,  and  said,  '  Sam,  you  must 
get  this  by  heart. '  She  went  up  stairs,  leaving  him  to 
study  it :  but  by  the  time  she  had  reached  the  second 
floor,  she  heard  him  following  her.  '  What's  the  mat- 
ter V  said  she.  '  I  can  say  it, '  he  replied  ;  and  re- 
peated it  distinctly,  though  he  could  not  have  read  it 
more  than  twice. ' ' 

The  same  famous,  though  sometimes  too  partial 
biographer  tells  us  that  Johnson,  when  a  child,  had 
the  misfortune  to  be  much  afiiicted  with  the  scrofula, 
or  king's  evil,  which  disfigured  a  countenance  well 
formed,  and  hurt  his  visual  nerves  so  much  that  he  did 
not  see  at  all  with  one  of  his  eyes,  though  its  appear- 
ance was  little  different  from  that  of  the  other.  There 
is  among  his  prayers  one  inscribed  ''When  miy  eye 
was  restored  to  its  use.^''  "  Which  ascertains  a  defect 
that  many  of  his  friends  knew  he  had,  though  I  never 
perceived  it.  I  supposed  him  to  be  only  near-sighted, 
and,  indeed,  I  must  observe  that  in  no  other  respect 
could  I  discern  any  defect  in  his  vision  ;  on  the  con- 
trary, the  force  of  his  attention  and  perceptive  quick- 


TOUCHED   BY   QUEEN   ANNE.  515 

ness  made  him  see  and  distinguish  all  manner  of 
objects,  whether  of  nature  or  of  art,  with  a  nicety  that 
is  rarely  to  be  found.  When  he  and  I  were  travelling 
in  the  Highlands  of  Scotland,  and  I  pointed  out  to  him 
a  mountain  which  I  observed  resembled  a  cone,  he  cor- 
rected my  inaccuracy,  by  showing  me  that  it  was  in- 
deed pointed  at  the  top,  but  that  one  side  of  it  was 
larger  than  the  other.  And  the  ladies  with  whom  he 
was  acquainted  agree  that  no  man  was  more  nicely 
and  minutely  critical  in  the  elegance  of  female  dress. 
....  It  has  been  said  that  he  contracted  this 
grievous  malady  from  his  nurse.  His  mother  yielded 
to  the  superstitious  notion,  which,  it  is  wonderful  to 
think,  prevailed  so  long  in  this  country,  as  to  the 
virtue  of  the  regal  touch — a  notion  which  our  kings  en- 
couraged, and  to  which  a  man  of  such  inquiry  and  such 
judgment  as  Carte  could  give  credit — and  carried  him 
to  London,  where  he  was  actually  touched  by  Queen 
Anne.  Mrs.  Johnson,  indeed,  as  Mr.  Hector  informed 
me,  acted  by  the  advice  of  the  celebrated  Sir  John 
Floyer,  then  a  physician  in  Lichfield.  Johnson  used 
to  talk  of  this  very  frankly  ;  and  Mrs.  Piozzi  has  pre- 
served his  very  picturesque  description  of  the  scene,  as 
it  remained  upon  his  fancy.  Being  asked  if  he  could 
remember  Queen  Anne,  '  he  had, '  he  said  '  a  confused, 
but  somehow  a  sort  of  solemn,  recollection  of  a  lady  in 
diamonds,  and  a  long  black  hood. '  This  touch,  how- 
ever, was  without  any  effect.  I  ventured  to  say  to 
him,  in  allusion  to  the  political  principles  in  which  he 
was  educated,  and  of  which  he  ever  retained  some 
odor,  that  '  his  mother  had  not  carried  him  far  enough, 
she  should  have  taken  him  to  Rome.'  "     Tlie  reference 


516  THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   DR.    JOHKSON. 

in  Boswell's  remark  is  not  to  the  pope  or  the  Roman 
Catholic  religion,  bnt  to  the  genuine  heir  of  the  throne 
of  the  Stuarts,  who  was  then  resident  at  Rome, 

Johnson  was  only  thirty  months  old  when  his  mother 
took  him  to  London  to  be  touched  by  Queen  Anne. 
During  this  visit,  he  tells  us,  his  mother  purchased  for 
him  a  small  sUver  cup  and  spoon.  "The  cup,"  he 
adds  touchingly,  "  was  one  of  the  last  pieces  of  plate 
which  dear  Tetty  (his  wife)  sold  in  our  distress.  I  have 
now  the  spoon.  She  bought  at  the  same  time  two  tea- 
spoons, and,  till  my  manhood,  she  had  no  more." 

Dr.  Johnson  spent  three  years  at  Pembroke  College, 
Oxford,  when  jDOverty  compelled  him  to  leave  it  and 
return  to  Lichfield,  in  1731,  and  his  father  died  in 
December  of  that  year.  His  state  of  poverty  when  he 
died  appears  from  an  entry  in  Latin  which  Johnson 
made  in  his  diary  on  the  15th  of  July,  1732,  and 
which,  translated  into  English,  runs  :  "  I  laid  by  eleven 
guineas  on  this  day,  when  I  received  twenty  pounds, 
being  all  that  I  have  reason  to  hope  for  out  of  my 
father's  effects,  previous  to  the  death  of  my  mother,  an 
event  which  I  pray  God  may  be  very  remote.  I  now 
therefore  see  that  I  must  make  my  own  fortune. 
Meanwhile  1  must  take  care  that  the  powers  of  my 
mind  be  not  debilitated  by  poverty,  and  that  indigence 
do  not  force  me  into  any  criminal  act. ' ' 

Samuel  Johnson's  ideas  of  reverence  to  parents  and 
of  the  special  affection  which  he  owed  to  his  mother 
would  find  little  favor  with  the  young  men  of  the 
present  day.  He  would  not  marry,  although  he  was 
then  nearly  twenty-six  years  of  age,  without  his 
mother's  consent.     Mrs.  Jolmson  coukl  hardly  think 


LETTER   TO  HIS  MOTHER.  517 

tlie  match  a  suitable  one,  but  she  loved  her  son  too 
well  to  refuse  her  blessing  on  it. 

In  the  month  of  January,  1759,  Johnson's  mother 
died,  seven  years  after  the  loss  of  his  wife,  of  whom  we 
shall  speak  presently.  He  writes  to  his  aged  parent 
as  soon  as  he  heard  of  her  illness  : 

To  Mrs.  Johnson,  in  Lichfield. 

"  January  13,  1759. 

"  Honored  Madam  :  The  account  which  Miss  [Porter]  gives  me 
of  your  health  pierces  my  heart.  God  comfort  and  preserve  you, 
and  save  you  for  the  sake  of  Jesus  Christ. 

"  I  would  have  Miss  read  to  you  from  time  to  time  the  Passion  of 
our  Saviour,  and  sometimes  the  sentences  in  the  Communion  Service, 
beginning,  '  Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that  travail  and  are  heavy  laden,  and 
I  will  give  you  rest. ' 

"  I  have  just  now  read  a  physical  book,  which  inclines  me  to  think 
that  a  strong  infusion  of  the  bark  would  do  you  good.  Do,  dear 
mother,  try  it. 

"  Pray,  send  me  your  blessing,  and  forgive  all  that.  I  have  done 
amiss  to  you.  And  whatever  you  would  have  done,  and  what  debts 
you  would  have  paid  first,  or  anything  else  that  you  would  direct,  let 
Miss  put  it  down  ;  I  shall  endeavor  to  obey  you. 

"  I  have  got  twelve  guineas  to  send  you,  but  unhappily  am  at  a 
loss  how  to  send  it  to-night.  If  I  cannot  send  it  to-night,  it  will 
come  by  the  next  post. 

"  Pray  do  not  omit  anything  mentioned  in  this  letter.  God  bless 
you  forever  and  ever. 

"  I  am  your  dutiful  son,  Sam.  .Johnson." 

The  Miss  Porter  alluded  to  in  this  letter  was  John- 
son's stepdaughter,  with  whom,  according  to  some  of 
his  biographers,  he  was  in  love  before  he  mamed  her 
mother.  Some  of  his  letters  in  relation  to  his  mother's 
last  illness  and  death  are  addressed  to  Miss  Porter 


518  THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF  DR.    JOHNSON. 

herself.  It  may  be  noticed  that  Bos  well  writes  of  her 
as  Mrs.,  but  "  Mistress,"  of  which  Mrs.  is  an  abbrevia- 
tion, was  used  at  that  period  of  single  as  well  as  of 
married  ladies.  Miss  Porter  lived  with  Johnson's 
mother. 

To  Miss  Portek  at  Mrs.  Johnson's,  in  Lichfield. 

"My  Dear  Miss  :  I  think  myself  obliged  to  you  beyond  all  ex- 
pression of  gratitude  for  your  care  of  my  dear  mother.  God  grant  it 
may  not  be  without  success.  Tell  Kitty  that  I  shall  never  forget  her 
tenderness  for  her  mistress.  Whatever  you  can  do,  continue  to  do. 
My  heart  is  very  full. 

"  I  hope  you  received  twelve  guineas  on  Monday.  I  found  a  way 
of  sending  them  by  means  of  the  Postmaster,  after  I  had  written  my 
letter,  and  hope  they  came  safe.  I  will  send  you  more  in  a  few 
days.     God  bless  you  all.      I  am,  my  dear, 

"  Your  most  obliged  and  most  humble  servant, 

"  Sam.  Johnson." 
"  Over  the  leaf  is  a  letter  to  my  mother." 

"January  Ifi,  1759. 
"  Dear  Honored  Mother  :  Your    weakness    affects    me  beyond 
what  I  am  willing  to  communicate  to  you.     I  do  not  think  you  unfit 
to  face  death,  but  I  know  not  how  to  bear  the  thought  of  losing  you. 
Endeavor  to  do  all  you  can  for  yourself.     Eat  as  much  as  you  can. 

"  I  pray  often  for  you,  do  you  pray  for  me.  I  have  nothing  to  add 
to  my  last  letter.     I  am,  dear  mother, 

"  Your  dutiful  son,         Sam.  Johnson." 

To  Mrs.  Johnson,  in  Lichfield. 

"January  18,  1759. 
"  Dear  Honored  Mother  :  I  fear  you  are  too  ill  for  long  letters  ; 
therefore  I  will  only  tell  you,  you  have  from  me  all  the  regard  that 
can  possibly  subsist  in  the  heart.     I  pray  God  to  bless  you  for  ever- 
more, for  Jesus  Christ's  sake.     Amen. 

"  Let  Miss  write  to  me  every  post,  however  short.  I  am,  dear 
mother.  Your  dutiful  son, 

"  Sam.  Johnson." 


DEATH  OF  HIS  MOTHER.  519 

To  Miss  Porter,  at  Mrs.  Johnson's,  in  Lichfield. 

"  January  20,  1759. 
"  Dear  Miss  :  I  will,  if  it  be  possible,  come  down  to  you.     God 
grant  that  I  may  yet  find  my  dear  mother  breathing  and  sensible. 
Do  not  tell  her,  lest  I  disappoint  her.     If  I  miss  to  write  next  post, 
I  am  on  the  road.     I  am,  my  dearest  Miss, 

"  Your  most  humble  servant,  Sam.   Johnson." 

On  the  other  side  : 

"  Dear  Honored  Mother  :  Neither  your  condition  nor  your  char- 
acter make  it  fit  for  me  to  say  much.  You  have  been  the  best 
mother,  and  I  believe  the  best  woman  .in  the  world.  I  thank  you  for 
your  indulgence  to  me,  and  beg  forgiveness  of  all  that  I  have  done 
ill,  and  all  that  I  have  omitted  to  do  well.  God  grant  you  his  Holy 
Spirit,  and  receive  you  to  everlasting  happiness,  for  Jesus  Christ's 
sake.  Amen.  Lord  Jesus  receive  your  spirit.  Amen. 
"  I  am,  dear,  dear  mother, 

"  Your  dutiful  son,  Sam.  Johnson." 

Among  his  "  Prayers  and  Meditations'^  we  find  the 
following  prayer  on  this  occasion  :  ''  Almighty  God, 
Merciful  Father,  in  whose  hands  are  life  and  death, 
sanctify  unto  me  the  sorrow  which  I  now  feel.  For- 
gme  me  wJiatever  I  liave  done  unkindly  to  tny  mother^ 
and  whatever  I  have  omitted  to  do  kindly.  Make  me 
to  remember  her  good  precepts  and  good  example,  and 
reform  my  life  according  to  thy  Holy  Word." 

Mrs.  Johnson  probably  died  on  the  20th  or  21st  of 

the  month.     Her  age  was  ninety-one  years,   and  she 

was    buried    on  the  day  when  the  next  letter  was 

written  : 

To  Miss  Porter,  in  Lichfield. 

"January  23,  1759. 
"  You  will  conceive  my  sorrow  for  the  loss  of  my  mother — of  the 
best  mother.     If  she  were  to  live  again,  surely  I  should  behave  better 


520  THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   DR.   JOHNSON. 

to  her.  But  she  is  happy,  and  what  is  past  is  now  nothing  to  her  ; 
and  for  me,  since  I  cannot  repair  my  faults  to  her,  I  hope  repentance 
will  efface  them.  I  return  you  and  all  those  that  have  been  good  to 
her  my  sincerest  thanks,  and  pray  God  to  repay  you  all  with  infinite 
advantage.  Write  to  me.  I  shall  send  a  bill  of  twenty  pounds  in  a 
few  days,  which  I  thought  to  have  brought  to  my  mother  ;  but  God 
suffered  it  not,  I  have  not  power  or  composure  to  say  much  more. 
God  bless  you,  and  bless  us  all.     I  am,  dear  Miss, 

"  Your  affectionate,  humble  servant,  Sam.  Johnson," 

To  pay  the  expenses  of  his  mother's  funeral  and  a 
few  debts  she  had  left,  Johnson  wrote  his  "  Rasselas," 
which  was  published  in  the  spring  of  1759,  He  com- 
posed it  in  the  evenings  of  one  week,  sent  it  to  the 
press  in  portions  as  it  was  written,  and  never  looked 
at  it  again  until  many  years  afterward,  when  he  found 
it  accidentally  in  a  chaise,  and  read  it  eagerly.  He  re- 
ceived for  this  work  one  hundred  pounds,  and,  on  its 
reaching  a  second  edition,  twenty-five  pounds  more. 
In  the  summer  of  1762  the  young  King  George  the 
Third,  on  the  advipe  of  the  Prime  Minister,  Lord  Bute, 
bestowed  the  pension  of  three  hundred  pounds  a  year 
upon  Johnson  for  life,  which  relieved  him  henceforth 
of  all  embarrassment  about  pecuniary  matters.  In  the 
following  year  he  was  first  introduced  to  his  future 
biographer,  Boswell. 

Some  of  Dr,  Johnson's  biographers  give  the  year  of 
his  marriage  as  1734,  others  as  1735,  but  all  agree  that 
the  day  and  month  were  the  9th  of  July,  His  wife 
was  Mrs.  Elizabeth  Porter,  a  widow,  whose  baptismal 
register  shows  her  to  have  been  born  on  the  4th  of 
February,  1688-9.  The  discrepancy  as  to  the  jenr 
doubtless  arises  from  what  was  known  as  the  "  old 


AN   UNEQUAL   MARRIAGE.  521 

■ 

style"  and  "  new  style."  As  Johnson  speaks  of  hav- 
ing passed  eighteen  years  with  her  in  the  married 
state,  and  as  she  is  said  to  have  been  in  her  forty- 
eighth  year  when  they  married,  the  statement  of  Bos- 
well  that  she  was  double  his  age  must  have  been  an  ex- 
aggeration. Leslie  Stephen,  in  the  "  English  Men  of 
Letters"  series,  writes  that  "having  no  money  and  no 
prospects,  Johnson  naturally  married.  The  attractions 
of  the  lady  were  not  very  manifest  to  others  than  her 
husband.  She  was  the  widow  of  a  Birmingham  mercer 
named  Porter.  Her  age  at  the  time  (1735)  of  the 
second  marriage  was  forty -eight,  the  bridegroom  being 
not  quite  twenty-six.""  The  notes  of  Edward  Malone 
to  Boswell's  "Life  of  Samuel  Johnson"  tell  us  that 
"  though  there  was  a  great  disparity  of  years  between 
her  and  Dr.  Johnson,  she  was  not  quite  so  old  as  is 
here  represented,  being  only  at  the  time  of  her  mar- 
riage in  her  forty-eighth  year."  Bos  well  gives  the 
year  of  her  marriage  to  Johnson  as  1734,  Leslie  as 
1735,  and  the  latter,  as  we  have  seen,  makes  her  to 
have  been  in  her  forty-ninth  instead  of  her  forty- 
eighth  year.  At  all  events,  the  disparity  of  their  ages 
was  such  that  she  was  old  enough  to  be  his  mother. 

Such  unequal  marriages  create  at  first  an  unpleasant 
feeling,  especially  if  we  accept  Leslie  Stephen's  sug- 
gestion that  Johnson  married  Mrs.  Porter  for  the  sake 
of  the  small  fortune  of  eight  hundred  pounds  which 
she  possessed.  Johnson  himself,  however,  always 
declared  that  he  married  her  for  love,  and  that  his  love 
was  returned.  Leslie  Stephen  adds  that  "the  biog- 
rapher's eye  was  not  fixed  upon  Johnson  till  after  his 
wife' s  death,  and  we  have  little  in  the  way  of  authentic 


522  THE   MOTHER    AND    WIFE   OF   DR.    JOHNSON. 

description  of  her  person  and  character.  Garrick, 
who  had  known  her,  said  that  she  was  very  fat,  with 
cheeks  colored  both  by  paint  and  cordials,  flimsy  and 
fantastic  in  her  dress,  and  affected  in  her  manners. 
She  is  said  to  have  treated  her  husband  with  some  con- 
tempt, adoj^ting  the  airs  of  an  antiquated  beauty, 
which  he  returned  by  elaborate  deference.  Garrick 
used  his  wonderful  powers  of  nnmicry  to  make  fun  of 
the  uncouth  caresses  of  the  husband,  and  the  courtly 
Beauclerc  used  to  provoke  the  smiles  of  his  audience 
by  repeating  Johnson's  assertion  that  "  it  was  a  love- 
match  on  both  sides." 

Before  attributing  mean  motives  to  Johnson,  whose 
whole  character  belies  the  charges,  we  ought  to  remem- 
ber that  his  physical  peculiarities  would  have  given 
him  no  chance  of  an  alliance  with  youth  and  beauty. 
To  understand  this,  we  have  only  to  recall  his  appear- 
ance and  idiosyncrasies  at  the  time.  ' '  The  morbid 
melancholy,"  says  Bos  well,  "  which  was  lurking  in  his 
constitution,  and  to  which  we  may  ascribe  those  par- 
ticularities, and  that  aversion  to  regular  life,  which  at 
a  very  early  period  marked  his  character,  gathered 
such  strength  in  his  twentieth  year  as  to  afflict  him  in 
a  dreadful  manner.  While  he  was  at  Lichfield,  in  the 
college  vacation  of  the  year  1729,  he  felt  himself  over- 
whelmed with  a  horrible  hypochondria,  with  perpetu- 
al irritation,  fretfuiness,  and  impatience,  and  with  a 
dejection,  gloom,  and  despair  which  made  existence 
misery.  From  tliis  dismal  malady  he  never  afterward 
was  perfectly  relieved,  and  all  his  labors  and  all  his 
enjoyments  were  but  temporary  interruptions  of  its 
baleful  influence.     How  wonderful,  how  unsearchable 


A   DEFECTIVE  NERVOUS   SYSTEM.  523 

are  the  ways  of  God  !  Johnson,  who  was  blessed  with 
all  the  powers  of  genius  and  understanding  in  a  degree 
far  above  the  ordinary  state  of  human  nature,  w^as  at 
the  same  time  visited  ^ith  a  disorder  so  afflictive,  that 
they  who  know  it  by  dire  experience  will  not  envy  his 
exalted  endowments.  That  it  was,  in  some  degree, 
occasioned  by  a  defect  in  his  nervous  system,  that  in- 
explicable part  of  our  frame,  appears  highly  probable, 
.  .  .  But  let  not  little  men  triumph  upon  knowing  that 
Johnson  was  an  Hypocliondrlac^  was  subject  to  what 
the  learned,  philosophical,  and  pious  Dr.  Cheyne  has 
so  well  treated  under  the  title  of  '  The  English 
Malady.'  Though  he  suffered  severely  from  it,  he 
was  not  therefore  degraded.  The  powers  of  his  great 
mind  might  be  troubled,  and  their  full  exercise  sus- 
pended at  times  ;  but  the  mind  itself  was  ever  entire. 
As  a  proof  of  this,  it  is  only  necessary  to  consider  that 
when  he  was  at  the  very  worst,  he  composed  that 
state  of  his  own  case,  which  showed  an  uncommon 
vigor,  not  only  of  fancy  and  taste,  but  of  judgment.  I 
am  aware  that  he  himself  was  too  ready  to  call  such  a 
comfjlaint  by  the  name  of  rriadness ;  in  conformity 
with  which  notion,  he  has  traced  its  gradations,  with 
exquisite  nicety,  in  one  of  the  chapters  of  his 
'  Rasselas.'  But  there  is  surely  a  clear  distinction 
between  a  disorder  which  affects  only  the  imagination 
and  spirits,  while  the  judgment  is  sound,  and  a 
disorder  by  which  the  judgment  itself  is  impaired. 
...  To  Johnson,  whose  supreme  enjoyment  was  the 
exercise  of  his  reason,  the  disturbance  or  obscuration 
of  that  facultv  was  the  evil  most  to  be  dreaded.  In- 
sanity,   therefore,   was  the  object  of  his  most  dismal 


524  THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   DR.    JOHNSON. 

apprehension  ;  and  lie  fancied  himself  seized  by  it,  or 
approaching  to  it,  at  the  very  time  when  he  was  giving 
proofs  of  a  more  than  ordinary  soundness  and  vigor  of 
judgment. ' '  Boswell  says  that  he  inherited  the  ' '  vile 
melancholy,"  as  Johnson  himself  called  it,  which  pro- 
cures "  a  weariness  of  life,  an  unconcern  about  those 
things  which  agitate  the  greater  part  of  mankind,  and 
a  general  sensation  of  gloomy  wretchedness,"  from  his 
father. 

Such  was  the  suitor  of  the  Widow  Porter — a  voune: 
man  of  wonderful  powers  of  mind  and  learning,  but 
ill-dressed  and  uncouth  in  manners  ;  lean  and  bony, 
with  the  scars  of  scrofula  deeply  marked  upon  his 
face,  with  haii'  straight  and  stiff,  for  he  had  not  then 
taken  to  a  wig,  and  above  all  addicted  to  "  convulsive 
starts  and  odd  gesticulations."  Some  have  imagined 
that  he  had  touches  of  St.  Vitus' s  dance,  but  his  friend 
Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  who  was  an  acute  observer, 
attributed  them  to  bad  habit,  as  did  Johnson  himself. 
"  He  could  sit  motionless,"  says  Sk  Joshua,  "  when  he 
was  told  to  do  so,  as  well  as  any  other  man."  Accord- 
ing to  this  view,  Johnson's  extraordinary  motions  were 
peculiar  effects  resulting  from  the  "bad  habit"  of 
absent-mindedness  and  of  accompanying  his  thoughts ' 
when  alone  with  grotesque  action.  The  following 
anecdote  is  in  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds's  own  words : 
"When  he  and  I  took  a  journey  together  into  the 
West,  we  visited  the  late  Mr.  Banks,  of  Dorsetshire  ; 
the  conversation  turning  upon  pictures,  which  Johnson 
could  not  well  see,  he  retired  to  a  corner  of  the  room, 
stretching  out  his  right  leg  as  far  as  he  could  reach 
before  him,  then  bringing  up  his  left  leg,  and  stretch- 


WIDOW   PORTER'S   OPINION.  525 

iug  his  right  still  further  on.  The  old  gentleman, 
observing  him,  went  up  to  him  and  in  a  very  courteous 
manner  assured  him,  though  it  was  not  a  new  house, 
the  flooring  was  perfectly  safe.  The  doctor  started 
from  Ms  reverie,  like  a  pejson  waked  out  of  his  sleep, 
but  spoke  not  a  word."  Hogarth  first  met  Johnson  at 
the  house  of  Richardson,  the  author  of  ''Pamela," 
who  has  been  called,  in  competition  with  Fielding, 
"the  father  of  the  English  novel.""  While  the  two 
were  conversing,  Hogarth  observed  a  person  standing 
at  a  window  in  the  room,  shaking  his  head,  and  rolling 
himself  about  in  a  strange,  ridiculous  manner.  He 
thought  the  man  must  be  an  idiot,  but  when  he  struck 
into  the  Conversation  Hogarth  was  confounded  at  his 
wit  and  wisdom.  When  a  young  girl  once  asked  Dr. 
Johnson,  "  Pray,  sir,  why  do  you  make  such  strange 
gestures  V '  he  replied,  ' '  From  bad  habit.  Do  you, 
my  dear,  take  care  to  guard  against  '  bad  habits.'  " 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  rotundity  of  Widow 
Porter  s  form,  or  her  rubicund  complexion,  she  proved 
herself  no  fool  by  remarking  to  her  daughter,  after 
their  first  introduction,  "  This  is  the  most  sensible  man 
I  ever  met  in  my  life."  Bos  well  remarks  truly  :  "  In 
a  man  whom  religious  education  has  secured  from 
licentious  indulgences,  the  passion  of  love,  when  once 
it  has  seized  him,  is  exceedingly  strong  ;  being  unim- 
paired by  dissipation  and  totally  concentrated  in  one 
object."  This  was  the  strange  first  love  that  attached 
Johnson  indissolubly,  even  by  death,  to  a  common- 
place and  perhaps  vulgar  woman  so  many  years  his 
senior.  Yet  we  have  the  account  given  to  Lady 
Knight  by  Mrs.    Williams,  an  intimate  friend  of   the 


526  THE   MOTHER  AND   WIFE  OF  DR.   JOHNSON. 

Johnsons,  and  an  inmate  of  their  home  for  many  years, 
that  Mrs.  Johnson  "had  a  good  understanding,  and 
great  sensibility,  though  inclined  to  be  satuical.  Her 
first  husband  died  insolvent  ;  her  sons  were  much  dis- 
gusted with  her  for  her  second  marriage,  perhaps 
because  they,  being  struggling  to  get  advanced  in  life, 
were  mortified  to  think  she  had  allied  herself  to  a  man 
who  had  not  any  visible  means  of  being  useful  to 
them  ;  however,  she  always  retained  her  affection  for 
them.  While  they  [Dr.  and  Mrs.  Johnson]  resided  in 
Gough  Square,  her  son,  the  officer,  knocked  at  the 
door,  and  asked  the  maid  if  her  mistress  was  at  home. 
She  answered,  '  Yes,  sir,  but  she  is  sick  in  bed.' 
'  Oh,'  says  he,  'if  it's  so,  tell  her  that  her  son  Jarvis 
called  to  know  how  she  did,'  and  was  going  away. 
The  maid  begged  she  might  run  up  to  tell  her  mistress, 
and  without  attending  his  answer,  left  him.  Mrs. 
Johnson,  enraptured  to  hear  that  her  son  was  below, 
desired  the  maid  to  tell  him  she  longed  to  embrace 
him.  When  the  maid  descended  the  gentleman  was 
gone,  and  poor  Mrs.  Johnson  was  much  agitated  by 
the  adventure  ;  it  was  the  only  time  he  ever  made  an 
effort  to  see  her."  Dr.  Johnson  did  all  he  could  to  con- 
sole his  wife,  but  told  Mrs.  Williams,  "  Her  son  is  uni- 
formly undutiful  ;  so  I  conclude  that,  like  many  other 
sober  men,  he  might  once  in  his  life  be  drunk,  and  in 
that  fit  nature  got  the  better  of  his  pride." 

One  can  understand  that  the  disparity  of  the  mar- 
riage might  offend  her  sons,  but  Jolinson's  character 
and  his  devotion  to  their  mother  ought  to  have  recon- 
ciled them  to  it.  She  had  done  nothing  to  deserve 
such  unfilial  neglect  and  Johnson's  satirical  remark  was 


A   BRIDAL   TOUR.  527 

a  just  one.     His  affection  was  compensation  to  her, 
however,  for  the  unkindness  of  her  childi'en. 

It  aiDpears  that  the  marriage  ceremony  was  per- 
formed at  Derby  and  not  at  Birmingham,  where  the 
lady  resided,  for  what  reason  we  do  not  ascertain,  but 
possibly  from  the  fear  of  opposition  or  annoyance  from 
her  sons.  The  bride  and  bridegroom  set  out  on  horse- 
back, and  Boswell  had  from  Johnson  himself  the 
foUouing  curious  account  of  their  journey  to  church 
upon  the  nuptial  morn  :  "  Sir,  she  had  read  the  old 
romances,  and  had  got  into  her  head  the  fantastical 
notion  that  a  woman  of  spirit  should  use  her  lover  like 
a  dog.  So,  sir,  at  first  she  told  me  that  I  rode  too  fast, 
and  she  could  not  keep  up  with  me  ;  and,  when  I  rode 
a  little  slower,  she  passed  me,  and  comi)lained  that  I 
lagged  behind.  I  was  not  to  be  made  the  slave  of 
caprice  ;  and  I  resolved  to  begin  as  I  meant  to  end.  I 
therefore  pushed  on  briskly,  till  I  was  fairly  out  of  her 
sight.  The  road  lay  between  two  hedges,  so  I  was 
sure  she  could  not  miss  it ;  and  I  contrived  that  she 
should  soon  come  up  with  me.  When  she  did,  I 
observed  her  to  be  in  tears," 

An  old  proverb  tells  us  that  "  the  quarrels  of  lovers 
are  the  renewing  of  love."  There  was  no  quarrel 
between  Johnson  and  his  bride,  but  no  doubt  she  loved 
him  the  better  for  this  playful  rebuke  of  her  imperi- 
ousness. 

We  need  not  trace  the  struggles  of  the  newly  married 
pair,  in  Johnson's  unfortunate  experiments  of  keei)ing 
school  and  subsequently  becoming  the  ill-paid  drudge 
of  booksellers  in  London.  To  that  world's  centre  he  set 
out  about  three  years  after  his  marriage,  accompanied 


528         THE  MOTHER   AXD   WIFE  OF  DR.    JOHNSON. 

by  his  old  friend  and  pupil,  David  Garrick.     He  left 
his  wife  at  Lichfield  till  he  could  make  a  home  for  her. 

The  journey  of  the  great  philosopher  and  great  actor 
of  the  future  was  begun  on  the  2d  of  March,  1737. 
Garrick  used  to  say  of  it,  "We  rode  and  tied." 
•Johnson  once  remarked  in  company,  trying  to  fix  the 
date  of  some  event,  "  That  was  the  year  when  I  came 
to  London  with  twopence-halfpenny  in  my  pocket." 
Garrick,  overhearing  him,  exclaimed,  "  Eh  !  what  do 
you  say  ?  with  twopence-halfpenny  in  your  pocket  V ' 
Johnson  replied  :  "  Why,  yes  ;  when  I  came  with  two- 
l)ence-halfpenny  in  my  jDOcket,  and  thou,  Davy,  with 
three  halfpence  in  thine."  He  carried  w^ith  him  also 
his  unpublished  tragedy  Irene.  A  bookseller,  on 
learning  that  he  intended  to  live  by  literature,  eyed 
his  huge  frame  attentively  and  said,  "  You  had  better 
buy  a  porter's  knot." 

Johnson,  well  schooled  in  poverty,  had  now  to  prac- 
tice rigid  economy.  "  I  dined,"  says  he,  "very  well 
for  eightpence,  with  very  good  company,  at  the  Pine- 
Apple,  in  New  Street,  just  by.  Several  of  them  had 
travelled.  They  expected  to  meet  every  day  ;  but  did 
not  know  one  another's  names.  It  used  to  cost  the 
rest  a  shilling,  for  they  drank  wine  ;  but  I  had  a  cut 
of  meat  for  sixpence,  and  bread  for  a  penny,  and  gave 
the  waiter  a  penny  ;  so  that  I  w^as  quite  well  served, 
nay,  better  than  the  rest,  for  they  gave  the  waiter  noth- 
ing." During  his  previous  two  years'  residence  at 
Birmingham  he  had  met  an  Irish  painter  who  had  lived 
in  London  and  brought  economy  to  a  fine  point.  He 
told  Johnson,  "  Thirty  pounds  are  enough  to  enable  a 
man  to  live  in  London  without  being  contemptible.  I 
allow  ten  pounds  for  clothes  and  linen.     You  may  live 


A  HARD   STRUGGLE.  529 

in  a  garret  at  eighteenpence  a  week  ;  few  people  will 
inquire  where  you  lodge  ;  and  if  they  do,  it  is  easy  to 
say,  '  Sir,  I  am  to  be  found  at  such  a  place.'  By 
spending  threepence  in  a  coffee-house  you  may  be  for 
some  hours  every  day  in  very  good  company  ;  you 
may  dine  for  sixpence,  breakfast  on  bread  and  cheese 
for  a  penny,  and  do  without  supper.  On  clean-shirt 
day  you  go  abroad  and  pay  visits." 

It  was  a  hard  struggle,  but  Johnson  fortunately  met 
with  a  gentleman  who  had  kno^vn  him  in  Lichfield  and 
had  now  a  house  in  London,  to  which  he  made  him 
always  welcome.  This  was  Mr.  Henry  Hervey,  of  the 
noble  family  of  which  the  Marquis  of  Bristol  is  now 
the  head,  and  Johnson  never  forgot  his  kindness,  but 
used  to  say,  ''  If  you  caU  a  dog  Hervey,  I  shall  love 
.him." 

In  the  summer  of  the  same  year,  1737,  Johnson 
returned  to  Lichfield,  stayed  with  his  wife  three 
months,  during  which  he  finished  his  tragedy,  and  then 
took  her  back  with  him  to  London.  He  was  unsuc- 
cessful in  getting  it  put  upon  the  stage,  until  eleven 
years  after  its  completion.  He  continued  to  be  a 
bookseller's  drudge  until  Cave,  the  editor  of  the  Gen- 
tleman'' s  Magazine,  gave  him  work.  One  of  his  letters 
to  that  patron  is  signed,  "■  Yours  imi^ransus,"  "  Yours 
without  a  dinner."  He  never  lost  his  magnanimity  and 
independence,  however,  and  writing  to  Cave,  who  owed 
him  money  for  work,  at  a  late  date,  he  only  says  :  "  If 
you  could  spare  me  another  guinea  for  the  history,  I 
should  take  it  very  kindly,  to-night,  but  if  you  do  not, 
I  shaU  not  think  it  an  injury.  I  am  almost  well 
again."  He  had  been  iU,  and  perhaps  his  supper 
depended  on  it. 


530,         THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   DR.    JOHNSON. 

On  the  14tli  of  March,  1752,  Johnson's  "  Tetty,"  as 
he  endearingly  called  his  wife,  died  in  the  night.  The 
Rev.  Dr.  Taylor,  who  had  been  immediately  sent  for 
by  the  bereaved  husband,  arrived  early  in  the  mroning, 
and  found  Johnson  in  tears  and  greatly  agitated. 
Shortly  after  he  entered  Johnson  asked  him  to  engage 
in  i)rayer.  They  both  prayed — each  in  turn  ;  and  this 
exercise  of  devotion  in  some  degree  tranquillized  the 
mind  of  the  sorrowing  man. 

On  the  18th  he  writes  to  Dr.  Taylor  :  "  Dear  sir,  let 
me  have  your  company  and  instruction.  Do  not  live 
away  from  me.  My  distress  is  great.  Pray  desire 
Mrs.  Taylor  to  inform  me  what  mourning  I  should  buy 
for  my  mother  and  Miss  Porter,  and  bring  a  note  in 
writing.  Remember  me  in  your  prayers,  for  vain  is 
the  help  of  man." 

His  wife  was  buried  in  Bromley  Church,  Kent,  and 
he  composed  a  funeral  sermon  for  her,  which,  however, 
was  never  preached.  Thirty  years  after  the  event 
Johnson  wrote  a  Latin  epitaph  which  he  had  inscribed 
on  his  wife's  tombstone,  the  translation  of  which  is  as 
follows  : 

Here  lie  the  remains  of 
E  LIZABETH, 

Sprung  from  the  ancient  family  of  the  Jarvises  of  Peatling,   near 

Leicester, 

Fair,  cultured,  gifted,  dutiful  ; 

Wife,  by  her  first  marriage,  of  Henry  Porter, 

By  her  second,  of  Samuel  Jolinson  : 

Who  covered  with  this  stone 

Her  -whom  he  loved  much,  and  wept  for  long. 

She    died   in   London,    in    the   month   of  March, 

A.D.  MDCCLIL 


JOHNSON'S   PRAYERS.  531 

The  follo\^i.ng  affecting  prayer  was  found  by  Dr. 
Johnsons  trusted  colored  servant,  Francis  Barber, 
after  his  death  : 

''  April  26th,  1752,  being  after  12  at  night  of  the  25th. 
— O  Lord  1  Governor  of  heaven  and  earth,  in  whose 
hands  are  embodied  and  departed  spirits,  if  Thou  hast 
ordained  the  souls  of  the  dead  to  minister  to  the  living, 
and  appointed  my  departed  wife  to  have  care  of  me, 
grant  that  I  may  enjoy  the  good  effects  of  her  attention 
and  ministration,  whether  exercised  by  appearance, 
impulses,  dreams,  or  in  any  other  manner  agreeable  to 
Thy  government.  Forgive  my  presumption,  enlighten 
my  ignorance,  and  however  meaner  agents  are  em- 
ployed, grant  me  the  blessed  influence  of  Thy  Holy 
Spirit,  through  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord.     Amen." 

Johnson  has  been  accused  of  superstition  and  ten- 
dency to  Roman  Catholicism  for  such  prayers  as  this. 
One  might  as  well  accuse  the  late  John  Keble,  the 
author  of  "  The  Christian  Year,"  of  superstition  when 
he  sings  : 

"  Oh,  soothe  us,  cheer  us,  day  by  day, 
Ye  happy  spirits  far  away 
"With  whom  we  shared  the  cup  of  grace  !" 

His  belief  in  ghost  stories  may  have  been  supersti- 
tious, but  we  can  see  no  superstition  in  his  praying 
even  for  his  departed  wife,  as  he  sometimes  did.  His 
love  for  her  lasted  through  fifty  years  of  his  own  life, 
unchanged  by  her  death,  and  there  is  something 
exquisitely  touching  in  the  fidelity  of  a  strong  man 
who  had  so  much  to  endure  in  mind  and  body. 

In  his  diary  we  find  such  entries  as  : 

"  March  28th,  1753.— I  kept  this  day  as  the  anni- 


533  THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   DR.    JOHNSON. 

versary  of  my  Tetty's  death,  with  prayer  and  tears  in 
the  morning.  In  the  evening  I  prayed  for  her  con- 
ditionally, if  it  were  lawful." 

"  April  23d,  1753. — I  know  not  whether  I  do  not  too 
much  indulge  the  vain  longings  of  affection  ;  but  I 
hope  they  intenerate  my  heart,  and  that  when  I  die 
like  my  Tetty,  this  affection  will  be  acknowledged  in  a 
happy  interview,  and  that  in  the  meantime  I  am  incited 
by  it  to  piety.  I  will,  however,  not  deviate  too  much 
from  common  and  received  methods  of  devotion. " 

The  wedding-ring  he  had  given  his  wife  at  their  wed- 
ding was  preserved  by  him,  as  long  as  he  lived,  in  a 
little  round  wooden  box,  in  the  inside  of  which  he 
pasted  a  slip  of  paper,  thus  inscribed  by  him  in  Latin  : 

"Eheu  ! 

ELIZ.  JOHNSON, 

Nupta  Jul.  9,  1736  ; 

Mortua,  eheu  ! 

Mart.  17,  1752." 

Perhaps  Johnson  had  forgotten  the  date  of  their 
marriage,  though  that  does  not  seem  likely,  but  it  is 
remarkable  that  173'6  should  now  be  tlie  year  given, 
the  two  previous  years  being  respectively  assigned  for 
that  event  by  Boswell  and  Leslie  Stephen,  The  affec- 
tion of  Johnson  for  his  wife  stands  out  bright  and 
beautiful,  the  more  so  if  it  be  true,  as  a  Mrs.  Desmou- 
lins,  who  lived  with  the  Johnsons  for  a  considerable 
time  before  her  own  marriage,  states  that  Mrs.  Johnson 
was  selfish  and  indulged  herself  in  country  air  and 
nice  living,  at  an  unsuitable  expense,  while  her  hus- 
band was  drudging  in  the  smoke  of  London,  and  that 


JOHNSON'S   LOVE   FOR   HIS    WIFE  533 

her  temper  and  treatment  of  him  were  not  always  of 
the  sweetest.  "  All  this,"  says  Boswell,  ''  is  perfectly 
compatible  with  his  fondness  for  her,  especially  when 
it  is  remembered  that  he  had  a  high  opinion  of  her 
understanding,  and  that  the  impressions  which  her 
beauty,  real  or  imaginary,  had  originally  made  upon 
his  fancy,  being  continued  by  habit,  had  not  been 
effaced,  though  she  herself  doubtless  was  much  altered 
for  the  worse." 

The  mean  insinuation  of  Sir  John  Hawkins,  that 
Johnson's  love  for  his  wife  was  assumed  and  not  real, 
is  too  absurd  for  comment.  A  man  who  did  not  care 
deeply  for  his  wife  would  not  have  commemorated 
her  each  year  and  in  his  daily  prayers  for  more  than 
thirty  years  after  her  death.  What  hypocrite  could 
write  the  following  outpouring  of  a  humble  and  con- 
trite heart,  a  year  after  she  was  taken  away  from  him, 
"  O  Lord,  who  givest  the  grace  of  repentance,  and 
hearest  the  prayer  of  the  penitent,  grant  that  by  true 
contrition  I  may  obtain  forgiveness  of  all  the  sins  com- 
mitted and  of  all  duties  neglected,  in  my  union  with  the 
wife  whom  Thou  hast  taken  from  me  ;  for  the  neglect 
of  joint  devotion,  patient  exhortation,  and  mild  in- 
struction" ?  Her  death  had  left  him  more  lonely  and 
despondent  than  before,  and  his  great  heart  readily 
accused  itself  of  omission  in  his  duty  to  her. 

On  Easter  day,  April  22d,  1764,  his  memorandum 
says,  "  Thought  on  poor,  dear  Tetty  with  my  eyes  full. 
Went  to  church.  After  sermon  I  recommended  Tetty 
in  a  prayer  by  herself  ;  and  my  father,  mother,  brother, 
and  Bathurst  in  another.  I  did  it  only  once,  so  far  as 
it  might  be  lawful  for  me."     In  this  pious,  even  if  it 


534         THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE  OF  DR.    JOHNSON. 

be  ineffectual,  custom  of  praying  for  the  dead,  Dr. 
Johnson  continued  to  the  end  of  his  life.  If  our  state 
when  our  earthly  life  closes  is  the  final  criterion  of 
our  everlasting  condition,  prayers  for  the  dead  can  do 
no  good.  But  Johnson  believed  in  an  intermediate 
state  and  in  a  communion  and  sympathy  between  the 
living  and  the  dead.  Protestant  churches  do  not  sanc- 
tion Dr.  Johnson's  practice,  but  many  of  the  greatest 
divines  of  the  English  Church,  to  which  he  belonged, 
have  approved  of  it.  At  any  rate,  the  practice  origi- 
nated in  the  best  feelings  of  our  nature,  and  is  the 
heart's  protest  against  the  stern  decrees  of  death. 
Such  prayers  are  really  benedictions  ;  they  are  mes- 
sages of  love  and  memory  to  the  other  world  ;  they 
keep  the  beloved  ones  who  have  gone  before  us  into 
the  world  of  spirits  always  in  our  mind,  and  they  incite 
us  so  to  live  as  to  be  deemed  worthy  of  eternal  reunion 
with  them  in  the  heavenly  land. 

Men  would  be  more  manly  than  they  are  if  they  had 
the  child-like  faith,  the  constant  love  and  fidelity  to 
mother,  wife,  and  friends  which  make  the  genius  and 
learning  of  Samuel  Johnson  shine  with  brighter  lustre 
through  succeeding  years. 


MOTHERS  OF  ANTIQUITY. 

The  theory  that  mothers  were  the  ruling  influence 
on  the  characteristics  of  theu^  children  is  not  a  new 
one,  having  been  held  by  the  ancients  as  an  indisputa- 
ble truth.  To  the  mothers  they  looked  as  the  source 
of  the  improvement  or  degeneracy  of  the  race.  Plu- 
tarch, alluding  to  the  training  and  position  of  Avoman 
under  the  laws  of  Lycurgus,  remarks  :  "  Hence  they 
were  furnished  with  sentiments  and  language  such  as 
Gergo,  the  wife  of  Leonidas,  is  said  to  have  made  use 
of.  When  a  woman  of  another  country  said  to  her, 
"  You  of  Lacedemon  are  the  only  women  in  the  world 
that  rule  the  men,"  she  answered,  "We  are  the  only 
women  that  bring  forth  men. " 

Of  many  of  the  mothers  of  antiquity,  even  of  those 
who  are  known  to  have  moulded  the  character  of  their 
children,  very  little  is  known,  and  for  them  there  is 
only  material  for  a  general  classification,  not  a  separate 
chapter.  Volumnia,  the  mother  of  Coriolanus,  as  is 
finely  indicated  by  Shakespeare,  had  a  powerful  influ- 
ence on  the  qualities  and  actions  of  her  son.  Thus, 
when  she  is  urging  Coriolanus  to  adopt  a  conciliatory 
policy  toward  the  people,  she  pleads  with  him  : 

"  I  prithee  now,  sweet  son  ;  as  thou  hast  said, 
My  praises  made  thee  first  a  soldier  ;  so, 
To  have  my  praise  for  this,  perform  a  part 
Thou  hast  not  done  before." 


536  MOTHERS   OF   ANTIQUITY. 

And,  again,  when  she  is  lamenting  his  banishment, 
Coriolanus  cries  : 

"  Nay,  mother, 
Resume  that  spirit,  when  you  were  wont  to  say, 
If  you  had  been  the  wife  of  Hercules, 
Six  of  his  labors  you'd  have  done,  and  saved 
Your  husband  so  much  sweat."  , 

His  wife,  on  the  other  hand,  is  little  better  than  a  lay 
figure  in  the  scene  where  he  consents  to  withdraw  his 
troops,  and  it  is  holding  his  mother  by  both  hands 
that  he  exclaims  : 

"  O  mother,  mother  ! 
You  have  a  happy  victory  for  Rome, 
But  for  your  son — " 

Nothing  is  known  of  the  mothers  of  many  of  the 
greatest  orators  and  writers  of  antiquity.  All  that  we 
know,  for  example,  of  the  mother  of  Julius  Caesar  is 
that  her  name  was  Aurelia,  and  even  that  fact  is  not 
mentioned  by  Plutarch.  She  carefully  watched  over 
the  education  of  her  children,  and  Caesar  always 
treated  her  with  the  greatest  affection  and  resjDect. 
All  that  is  known  of  Olympias,  the  mother  of  Alexan- 
der the  Great,  strongly  confirms  the  theory  of  maternal 
influence  ;  for  the  intemperance  and  bursts  of  passion 
which  sullied  his  greatness  may  be  traced  to  her,  as  well 
as  the  restless  and  discontented  nature  which  made 
liim  weep  because  there  were  no  more  worlds  to  con- 
quer. "  In  violence  of  temper,"  says  Grote,  "  in  jeal- 
ous, cruel,  vindictive  disposition,  she  forms  almost  a 
X)arallel  to  the  Persian  Queens  Amestris  and  Parysa- 


OCTAVIA  AS   WIFE  AND   MOTHER.  537 

tis."  Alexander  quarrelled  with  PMlip  of  Macedon, 
his  father,  for  denouncing  her,  and  always  treated  her 
with  the  greatest  respect,  although  she  gave  him  so 
much  trouble  by  her  intrigues,  during  his  absence  in 
Asia,  that  he  "  was  wont  to  say  that  his  mother  ex- 
acted from  him  a  heavy  house-rent  for  his  domicile  of 
ten  months."  After  his  death  she  usurped  the 
sui^reme  authority  in  Macedonia,  and  caused  more 
than  one  hundred  of  the  jDarty  opposed  to  her  to  be 
put  to  death  ;  but  within  a  few  months  she  was  de- 
serted by  her  adherents,  and  brought  as  a  criminal 
before  a  popular  assembly,  when  sentence  of  death  was 
passed  upon  her  ;  yet  such  was  the  awe  and  reverence 
inspired  by  the  mother  of  Alexander,  that  the  sen- 
tence would  have  remained  inoperative  if  the  sons  of 
her  victims  had  not  volunteered  to  execute  it." 

OcTAviA,  the  sister  of  Augustus  Cassar,  was  one  of 
the  most  illustrious  women  of  ancient  Rome.  Her 
second  husband,  Antony,  treated  her  so  contemptu- 
ously, under  the  influence  of  Cleopatra,  that  the  peojDle 
of  Eome  were  indignant,  and  while  expressing  hatred 
and  contempt  for  him,  they  showed  Octavia  every 
honor.  Antony  was  her  second  husband,  and  her 
household  consisted  of  one  son  by  her  first  husband, 
her  daughters  by  Antony,  and  several  children  of 
Antony's  by  his  first  wife.  She  was  an  admirable 
mother  and  stepmother.  Her  son  was  a  lad  of  great 
genius,  whom  her  brother  married  to  his  daughter,  and 
declared  him  heir  to  the  throne.  He  died  shortly 
afterward,  and  was  believed  to  have  been  poisoned  by 
his  '  mother-in-law,    who    was  also    his  ■  aunt.     Virgil 


538  ,        MOTHERS  OF   ANTIQUITY. 

wrote  in  honor  of  this  youth  a  eulogy,  in  the  conclu- 
sion of  the  sixth  ^neicl,  and  when  he  read  it  to  Octavia 
she  fainted.  Afterward  she  generously  rewarded  the 
poet.  Few  women  of  antiquity  are  more  admirable  in 
character  than  Octavia,  who,  as  woman,  w^ife,  and 
mother,  was  a  shining  example  to  her  sex. 

Agripphsta,  the  mother  of  Nero,  was  a  woman  of 
superior  mind  and  immense  ambition.  She  was  the 
daughter  of  Agrippina  and  her  husband  Germanicus. 
She  ascended  the  throne  of  her  grandfather  Augustus, 
as  the  wife  of  Claudius,  and  was  the  first  woman  who 
acquired  the  privilege  of  entering  the  capitol  in  the 
vehicle  assigned  to  the  priests  in  religious  ceremonies. 
Her  title,  after  she  married,  was  Augusta.  Upon  her 
son  Nero  she  centred  her  ambition,  and  so  unwise  was 
she  in  her  conduct  toward  him  that  she  was  warned  to 
be  careful  or  her  folly  would  be  her  ruin.  Others 
doubted  the  son  upon  whom  she  lavished  such  un- 
stinted praise  and  attention.  She  was  told  that  his 
elevation  might  be  her  ruin,  and  she  replied,  "  Let 
me  perish,  but  let  Nero  reign."  She  was  an  astute 
politician  and  a  wise  ruler,  but  she  w^as  weak  in  her 
conduct  toward  her  son.  At  the  age  of  eighteen  she 
succeeded  in  making  him  emperor,  and  for  a  time  he 
was  grateful  to  her,  and  paid  her  marked  respect. 
But  in  time  his  true  character  showed  itself,  and  he 
was  not  the  son  his  fond  mother  believed  him  to  be. 
At  last  he  publicly  insulted  her.  On  the  occasion  of  a 
public  reception  to  an  embassy  from  the  East,  as  she 
moved  forward  to  take  her  usual  seat  beside  him,  Nero 
sprang  forward,  and  with  officious  x^oliteness  and  ironi- 


AGRIPPIXA   AND   HELVIA.  539 

cal  courtesy  prevented  her  from  doing  so.  Too  late 
she  realized  the  wrong  she  had  done  herself  in  her 
course  toward  her  son.  He  was  one  of  the  most  cruel 
and  utterly  despicable  characters  that  ever  lived,  and 
Ills  mother  strengthened  his  worst  characteristics  by 
her  self-abnegation  toward  him.  He  had  her  mur- 
dered in  return  for  the  fondness  and  favor  she  had 
shown  him.  Agrippina  wi'ote  her  own  memoirs,  and 
was  a  woman  of  undoubted  intellectual  endowments 
and  great  personal  attractions. 

One  of  the  most  remarkable  of  the  early  Christian 
women  was  the  mother  of  Symphorian,  whose  son,  in 
the  time  of  the  Emperor  Marcus  Aurelius,  was  con- 
demned to  die  because  he  w^as  a  Christian.  It  is  re- 
lated that  on  his  way  to  execution,  his  mother,  unable 
to  see  him  while  in  prison,  mounted  the  wall  in  order 
to  bid  him  farewell,  and  instead  of  wails  of  lamentation 
she  greeted  him  with  these  words  :  "  My  son,  my  son 
Symphorian,  cleave  to  the  living  God  !  Resume  your 
courage,  my  child !  We  cannot  fear  death,  for  it 
surely  leads  to  life.  Lift  up  your  heart,  my  son  ! 
Behold  Him  who  reigneth  in  the  heavens  !  Your  life 
is  not  taken  away  to-day  ;  you  go  to  life  above  !" 
Surely,  such  coiirage  is  not  surpassed  in  any  age  or  by 
any  mother. 

Helvia,  the  mother  of  Cicero,  is  never  alluded  to  by 
her  son.  She  was  of  good  family,  and  was  rich,  and 
must  have  been  a  woman  of  some  education.  Tlie  only 
mention  of  her  that  has  come  down  to  us  is  an  incident 
told  by  her  young  son  Quintus,  v/lio,  ^vriting  a  famil- 


540  MOTHERS  OF  ANTIQUITY. 

iar  letter  to  one  of  Ms  fathers  slaVes,  a  young  man, 
tells  him  that  his  mother  sealed  up  the  empty  wine- 
jars,  as  well  as  those  which  were  full,  so  that  a  Jar 
emptied  on  the  sly  by  a  thieving  servant  might  at  once 
be  detected.  So  trivial  a  thing  as  this  is  all  that  is 
told  of  the  mother  of  Cicero,  and  it  is  all  the  more 
to  be  remarked  because  he  speaks  repeatedly  of  his 
father. 

The  mother  of  St.  Ambrose  conducted  his  educa- 
tion, and  when  it  became  necessary  for  him  to  seek 
other  teachers  than  herself,  she  accompanied  him  to 
liome  and  became  the  companion  of  his  studies. 
Years  later,  when  acknowledged  the  foremost  prelate 
of  his  time,  in  his  own  account  of  his  sister,  a  lovely 
Christian  woman,  he  paid  earnest  tribute  to  the  influ- 
ence exerted  by  this  mother  upon  his  youth  and  early 
manhood,  as  a  preparation  for  the  service  to  which  he 
afterward  consecrated  his  life.  Indeed  it  was  to  a 
bevy  of  Christian  mothers  that  the  movement  against 
imperial  oppression,  in  the  reign  of  Julian  the  Apos- 
tate, owed  its  greatest  leaders.  Under  the  eye  of  their 
mother  Emmelia  and  their  grandmother,  Basil  and 
Csesarius  learned  the  law  of  liberty,  which  became  the 
law  of  their  lives.  Under  the  guidance  of  their  mother 
Gregory,  their  friend  and  companion,  dedicated  be- 
fore his  birth  to  the  service  o:^  the  Master,  was  educated 
from  his  childhood,  like  the  infant  Samuel,  as  an  offer- 
ing to  the  Highest. 

Jerome  speaks  in  his  writings  of  his  mother  and  his 
maternal  grandmother  as  the  teachers  of  his  infancy, 


HELENA  AND   CHKYSOSTOM.  541 

and  gives  testimony  to  the  fact  that  to  his  mother  he 
owed  his  religious  training.  From  the  arms  of  his 
grandmother,  he  says,  he  had  to  be  taken  by  force 
when  he  was  sent  away  to  a  master. 

Helena,  the  wdfe  of  Constantius  and  the  mother  of 
Constantine,  was  one  of  the  more  eminent  of  the  early 
Christians.  Her  hi^sband  divorced  her  on  his  eleva- 
tion to  the  rank  of  Csesar,  but  w^hen  Constantine  as- 
cended the  throne  she  was  proclaimed  the  Empress 
Mother.  She  was  paid  every  honor,  and  was  dearly 
beloved  by  the  religious  sect  whose  cause  she  had  es  - 
poused.  When  nearly  fourscore  years  old  she  set  out 
on  a  pilgrimage  to  Palestine,  then,  as  now,  the  Holy 
Land  of  the  Christians.  All  along  the  route  her  charities 
and  sumj)tuous  devotions  were  most  marked,  and  her 
presence  was  everywhere  hailed  with  delight.  She 
caused  several  churches  to  be  erected,  and  the  Emperor 
Constantine  had  erected  a  magnificent  basilica  on  the 
spot  where  she  thought  she  found,  in  the  sepulchre 
of  the  Saviour,  the  cross  upon  which  He  died.  Her 
later  years  were  devoted  to  the  observance  of  her 
religious  duties. 

Chrysostom  owed  to  his  mother,  Anthusa,  the  widow 
of  an  imiDerial  general,  the  tenderest  care,  and  he  gave 
in  return  the  sincerest  affection.  \Yhen  her  son  had 
made  up  his  mind  to  retire  to  a  convent  and  spend  his 
life  apart  from  the  world,  as  his  nearest  friend  had 
done,  his  mother  prevented  such  a  step,  believing  that 
his  usefulness  to  the  world  would  be  more  marked  out- 
side than  within  the  convent  walls.     He  tells  us  how 


5-i3  MOTHERS   OF   ANTIQUITY. 

she  influenced  liis  decision.  Taking  liim  by  the  hand, 
she  led  him  into  her  chamber,  where  she  broke  into 
tears  and  "  into  words  more  moving  than  any  tears." 
She  told  him  of  her  grief  over  the  death  of  his  father 
'Soon  after  his  birth,  and  spoke  of  the  efforts  she  had 
made  to  provide  for  his  education  and  preserve  to  him 
her  husband's  property.  Her  request  to  him  was  that 
he  would  not  leave  her  in  a  second  widowhood,  or 
renew  a  sorrow  that  had  been  partly  assuaged. 
"Wait,  at  least,"  she  said,  "until  I  am  dead;  and 
that  will  not  be  long." 

Obeying  his  mother,  Chrysostom  attained  to  a  dig- 
nity and  usefulness  that  would  not  have  been  reached 
by  him  perhaps  within  the  cloister. 

So  potent  and  beneficent  had  been  his  mother's  influ- 
ence over  him  that  he  honored  all  women,  and  enter- 
tained an  exalted  idea  of  the  power ,  of  a  Christian 
mother.  The  position  he  accorded  a  Christian  woman 
in  the  fourth  century  is  more  advanced  than  that 
granted  her  in  many  denominations  in  this  nineteenth 
century.  In  a  letter  to  a  noble  Roman  lady,  he  thus 
expressed  his  views  on  this  subject  : 

"In  the  order  of  affairs  in  this  world,  as  in  that 
of  nature,  each  sex  has  its  particular  sphere  of  ac- 
tion :  to  the  woman,  household  affairs  ;  to  the  man, 
public  business,  the  government  of  the  city,  discus- 
sions in  the  agora.  But  in  the  work  which  has  the 
service  of  God  for  its  object,  in  the  Church  militant, 
these  distinctions  are  effaced,  and  it  often  hapj)ens  that 
the  woman  excels  the  man  in  the  courage  with  which 
she  supports  her  opinions,  and  in  her  holy  zeal.  .  .  . 
Do  not  consider  as  unbecoming  to  your  sex  that  ear- 


PAULA,   THE  RECLUSE.  543 

nest  work  wliicli  in  any  way  promotes  the  welfare  of 
the  faithful.  On  the  contrary,  I  nrge  yon  to  use  every 
effort  to  calm,  either  by  your  own  influence  or  by  that 
of  others  whom  you  can  convince,  the  fearful  storm 
which  has  burst  upon  the  Eastern  churches.  This  is 
the  great  work  which  I  beg  you  to  undertake  with  the 
utmost  diligence  ;  the  more  frightful  the  tempest,  the 
more  precious  the  recompense  for  your  sliare  in  calm- 
ing it." 

Paula,  the  illustrious  recluse  and  high-born  widow 
of  Rome,  was  a  mother  whose  religious  frenzy  caused 
her  to  sacrifice  her  maternal  feelings  for  the  sake  of  her 
belief.  She  gave  up  Rome  and  society  and  abandoned 
four  of  her  children  to  go  to  the  Holy  Land,  and  there 
live  the  life  of  a  recluse.  She  was  the  mother  of  five 
children,  and  her  teacher  Jerome  says  of  the  four  she 
left  behind  her  : 

"  Her  little  son  stood  on  the  shore,  stretching  out 
his  suppliant  hands.  Her  daughter  of  marriageable 
years  appeared  to  beseech  with  silent  tears  that  her 
mother  would  wait  her  nuptials.  Yet  she  fixed  her 
dry  eyes  on  the  heavens,  conquering  her  love  toward 
her  children  by  love  toward  her  God." 

Let  it  not  be  supposed  that  she  found  rest  or  spirit- 
ual freedom  in  the  distant  Jerusalem  convent.  Twenty 
years  she  struggled  and  suffered,  and  her  charities 
were  incessant.  Toils  and  penances  kept  pace  with  her 
charities  ;  but  Jerome,  who  had  persuaded  her  to  make 
the  sacrifice  she  did  in  behalf  of  her  religion,  admits 
that  her  life  was  a  long  martyrdom.  Even  on  her 
death-bed  she  could  not  say  that  "all  was  quiet  and 


544  MOTHERS   OF  ANTIQUITY. 

tranquil."  She  had  given  up  her  earthly  duties  in  the 
hope  of  gaining  a  spiritual  reward,  but  her  mother 
heart  was  broken  in  the  effort.  She  was  miserable, 
even  though  her  religious  zeal  was  sufficient  to  keej) 
her  in  the  way  she  had  determined  to  go. 

Among  the  beautiful  pictures  of  the  mothers  of 
olden  time,  what  more  touching  than  that  of  Rachel, 
daughter  of  Laban,  wife  of  Jacob,  and  mother  of 
Joseph  and  Benjamin.  How  faithful  the  affection  of 
the  husband,  who  served  seven  long  years  for  the  dear 
reward  of  E-acheFs  hand,  "and  they  seemed  to  him 
but  a  few  days,  for  the  love  he  bore  her."  And  yet 
another  seven  years  he  served  the  cunning  Laban,  who 
deceived  him  in  giving  the  eldest,  instead  of  the 
youngest  daughter,  to  the  patient  lover.  That  she  was 
exceedingly  lovely  in  character  as  well  as  in  person 
must  be  the  case,  since  the  affection  of  his  manhood 
continued  undimmed  iintil  his  latest  breath,  and  he 
passionately  cherished  the  memory  of  the  one  chosen 
out  of  all  the  world,  and  even  her  grave  was  kept  pre- 
cious. Her  sons  Joseph  and  Benjamin  are  picturesque 
and  important  characters  in  Hebrew  history. 

Among  the  most  celebrated  of  the  statues  to  be 
found  in  Rome  is  one  of  Faustina,  the  daughter  of 
Antoninus  Verus,  prefect  of  the  Imperial  city,  and  the 
wife  of  the  great  and  good  Titus  Antoninus  Pius. 
She  was  also  mother  of  Annia  Faustina,  who  married 
the  Emperor  Marcus  Aurelius.  These  beautiful 
women  shared  the  throne  with  the  noblest,  wisest,  and 
most  revered  of  all  who  came  to  the  highest  honors  of 


HISTORY   UNJUST.  545  ■ 

the  City  of  the  Seven  Hills.  History  has  been  terribly 
unjust  to  these  beautiful  wives  and  mothers,  for  one 
account  renders  them  dissolute  and  unscrupulous. 
That,  however,  is  incredible,  nor  is  it  impossible  to 
guess  at  the  source  of  the  calumnies  which  have  been 
circulated  about  them,  since  ancient  history  is  too 
often  only  common  rumor  transfixed  by  the  art  of 
the  writer.  We  are  sure  that  the  noble  Antoninus 
built  temples  to  the  honor  of  his  empress,  and  coins 
have  been  found  bearing  her  beautiful  effigy,  and  that 
he  loved  her  with  tenderness  and  constancy  words 
written  by  his  own  hand  attest.  After  her  death 
temples  were  dedicated  to  the  memory  of  the  woman 
so  lovely  and  beloved.  And  there  is  still  extant  a 
medal  representing  Antoninus  Pius  on  one  side,  and  on 
the  other  Faustina  ascending  heavenward  under  the 
figure  of  Diana.  Her  daughter  inherited  her  virtues 
with  her  name,  Faustina.  And  Marcus  Aurelius, 
whose  meditations  and  maxims  have  been  the  admu'a- 
tion  of  all  time,  gives  thanks  to  the  gods  for  a  consort 
so  lovely  and  so  loving.  Yet  she,  like  her  mother,  was 
slandered  by  the  envious.  The  elder  Faustina  died 
about  the  year  140  ;  the  younger,  who  was  the  grand- 
mother of  the  wife  of  Heliogabulus,  died  a.d.  175. 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE  AND 
MOTHER. 

The  world  lias  never  seen  and  never  can  see  a  sadder 
and  more  pathetic  biograi^hy  than  that  of  Marie  Antoi- 
nette. As  Andromache  and  Hecuba  moved  by  their 
accnmnlated  and  mysterious  sorrow  the  sympathy  and 
tears  of  the  ancient  world,  so  has  the  story  of  Marie 
Antoinette  moved  those  of  the  modern.  It  will  in  a 
very  few  years  more  be  a  century  since  the  French 
Revolution  broke  out,  and  it  was  ninety  years  ago,  on 
the  16th  of  October,  since  her  noble  and  afflicted  life 
was  ended  by  the  guillotine.  Yet  her  figure  is  as  prom- 
inent and  distinct  in  its  personality  to-day  as  when 
she  died ;  and  when  even  a  child  still  in  its  teens  is 
asked  to  give  instances  of  beautiful  women  distin- 
guished for  their  misfortunes  and  their  heroism,  the 
first  that  occurs  to  it  in  answer  is  nearly  always  Marie 
Antoinette.  The  blush  of  shame  that  first  touched  the 
hard  face  of  her  executioner,  and  made  his  right  hand 
tremble  and  forget  its  wonted  cunning  in  unfastening 
the  axe,  spread  over  the  face  and  neck  of  France,  pro- 
ducing the  reaction  from  the  Reign  of  Terror  which 
called  forth  Napoleon,  and  made  monarchy  again  pos- 
sible to  a  peojjlewho  had  shown  their  inability  to  real- 
ize the  sacred  name  of  republic.  The  hapless  queen 
is  still  an  object  of  sympathy  as  well  as  of  the  sense  of 
national  shame  to  all  intelligent  and  honest  Frenchmen. 


A   DESCEXDA^;T   OF   THE   C^SARS.  547 

And  not  only  in  France,  but  in  England  and  America, 
and  in  every  country  of  the  Old  World  and  the  New 
where  there  are  minds  to  study  history  and  hearts  to 
feel  for  the  unutterable  woes  and  cruel  sufferings  of  a 
woman,  the  grave  of  Marie  Antoinette  is  kept  green 
and  flower- strewn  and  tear- watered  in  the  memory. 

Around  her  majestic  and  imperial  figure,  worthy 
descendant  of  the  Csesars  as  she  was,  cluster  so  many 
serious  and  salutary  reflections  that  it  is  difficult  to 
keep  one's  mental  hold  on  any  one  of  them.  Here  is  a 
woman,  supported  through  such  experiences  as  make 
the  least  emotional  of  us  shudder  even  now  to  think  of, 
and  we  wonder  how  she  retained  her  reason  and  her 
trust  in  God.  Here  are  millions  of  blood-stained 
beasts  in  human  form  around  her,  who  prate  of  liberty, 
equality,  and  fraternity.  Here  are  judges,  elected  from 
the  slums  and  dens  of  an  accursed  and  polluted  city, 
canting  about  justice  and  filling  the  tumbrils  with  their 
murdered  victims.  In  other  tragedies  there  is  an  in- 
terlude of  light  and  hope  ;  in  this  one  there  is  none. 
From  the  discovery  and  arrest  of  the  fugitive  royal 
family  at  Varennes  to  the  scaffold  that  faced  the  gar- 
dens of  the  Tuileries,  there  is  no  respite,  no  relief,  no 
ray  of  hope,  no  parenthesis  of  pity.  From  palace  to 
prison,  from  prison  to  dungeon,  from  the  Tuileries  to 
the  Temple,  from  the  Temple  to  the  Conciergerie,  from 
the  Conciergerie  to  the  common  felons'  prison  and  the 
•  guillotine — this  is  the  cumulative  story  of  the  royal 
victim,  these  the  steps  of  the  ensanguined  ladder  that 
bore  her  heroic  footsteps  from  earth  to  heaven. 

How  tliankf id  ought  we,  as  Americans,  to  feel  that 
our  own  Republic  originated  in  true  liberty,  just  rights, 


548        MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

and  patriotic  feeling,  and  was  not  stained  mtli  tlie 
atrocious  crimes  that  attended  and  finally  destroyed 
the  sham  Republic  of  the  French  Revolution  of  1789. 
Especially  ought  we  to  feel  this  as  we  contemplate  the 
mean  figure  which  Lafayette  cut  in  his  own  country's 
revolution,  after  all  the  noble  examples  of  manly  cour- 
age and  lofty  principle  which  he  must  have  seen  in  his 
friend  George  Washington  and  the  other  fathers  of  our 
new-born  Republic.  As  commander-in-chief  of  the 
National  Guard  of  Paris,  Lafayette  had  the  jjrotec- 
tion  of  the  king's  palace  assigned  to  him.  He  dis- 
charged this  trust,  not  as  a  guardian,  but  as  a  jailer  and 
.a  sx3y,  because,  as  that  keen  judge  of  character,  Napo- 
leon Bonaparte,  afterward  remarked,  his  popularity 
depended  upon  his  keeping  the  king  a  close  prisoner, 
as  he  had  no  great  talents,  military  or  political,  of  his 
OAvn.  The  Marshal  de  Bouille,  who  was  his  cousin, 
also  said  of  him  :  ''The  bishop  of  Panders  has  pict- 
ured to  me  the  miserable  situation  of  the  king  and 
royal  family,  which  the  rigor  and  harshness  of  Lafay- 
ette, who  lately  became  their  jailer,  rendered  day  by 
day  more  insujoportable.'"  He  was  moved  also  by 
personal  dislike  to  the  unhappy  Louis  XYL 

But  while  the  jailers  and  the  false  accusers,  the  ene- 
mies and  the  executioners  of  the  royal  pair,  and  of  the 
sainted  and  self-consecrating  Madame  Elizabeth,  the 
king's  sister,  group  themselves  necessarily  around  the 
sublime  figure  of  Marie  Antoinette,  we  prefer  for  a  * 
time  to  glance  briefly  at  her  earlier  history,  beginning 
with  her  childhood  in  the  Austrian  palaces,  and  to  let 
her,  as  the  dawn  of  womanhood  breaks  upon  her  girlish 
heart,  surround  herself  with  the  husband  and  children 


MARIA   THERESA   OF   AUSTRIA.  549 

to  whom  slie  was  "  faithful  unto  death.- '  We  shall 
find,  as  we  pass  her  childhood  briefly  in  review,  that  her 
own  mother's  training  of  her  children,  sixteen  in  num- 
ber, w^as  anything  but  a  preparation  for  the  heroic 
martyrdom  that  awaited  her.  One  has  only  to  glance 
at  the  portrait  of  ^laria  Theresa  of  Austria,  mother  of 
Marie  Antoinette,  to  see  in  her  resolute  features  and 
bold,  aggressive  eyes  the  woman  born  to  rule,  and  not 
scrupulous  about  the  means  of  ruling.  Marie  Antoi- 
nette inherited  doubtless  from  this  mother  her  firmness 
and  physical  courage,  but  frf»m  her  father  her  gentle- 
ness and  charity,  and  love  of  happiness  and  peace. 
She  herself  once  said  that  she  had  learned  from  thp 
example  of  her  mother  not  to  fear  death. 

Marie  Antoinette  Josephe  Jeanne  was  the  youngest 
daughter  of  Francis,  originally  Duke  of  Lorraine, 
afterward  Grand  Duke  of  Tuscany,  and  eventually 
Emperor  of  Germany,  and  of  Maria  Theresa,  Arch- 
duchess of  Austria,  Queen  of  Hungary  and  Bohemia, 
more  generally  known,  after  the  attainment  of  the  im- 
perial dignity  by  her  husband  in  1745,  as  the  Empress- 
Queen.  Of  her  brothers,  two,  Joseph  and  Leopold, 
succeeded  in  turn  to  the  imperial  dignity,  and  one 
of  her  sisters,  Caroline,  became  the  Avife  of  the  King  of 
IN'aples.  She  was  born  on  the  2d  of  ]N"ovember,  1755, 
a  day  which  was  often  referred  to  in  her  later  years  as 
having  been  ominous  of  her  misfortunes,  being  that 
upon  which  the  terrible  earthquake  occurred  which 
laid  Lisbon  in  ruins. 

In  the  days  of  Charles  YL,  the  father  of  Maria 
Theresa  and  grandfather  of  Marie  Antoinette,  the  Aus- 
trian imperial  court  had  been  famed  for  pompous  dig- 


550        MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS    WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

nity  and  punctilious  etiquette,  but  the  Lorraine  prov- 
inces had  been  bred  in  simj^ler  fashions,  and  Francis 
had  a  dislike  to  all  ostentation,  while  Maria  Theresa 
had  her  time  and  thoughts  occupied  with  the  weightier 
affairs  of  state.  They  therefore  j^referred  greatly  to 
their  gorgeous  jDalace  at  Vienna  a  smaller  one  which 
they  possessed  in  the  neighborhood,  called  Schim- 
brunn,  where  they  could  cultivate  rural  and  domestic 
tastes  and  bring  uj)  their  children  healthily. 

In  this  quiet  home  Marie  Antoinette  j^assed  a  happy 
childhood.  Her  beauty,  intelligence,  and  affectionate 
disposition  made  her  the  favorite  of  her  father,  and  the 
^rst  sorrow  she  ever  knew  was  at  his  death,  which  oc- 
curred in  1765,  before  she  was  ten  years  old.  He  was 
going  to  Innspruck  on  some  business,  and  his  carriage 
was  drawn  up  in  the  courtyard  of  his  palace.  Before 
starting  he  asked  for  his  little  daughter,  that  he  might 
kiss  her  good-by.  ''  Adieu,  my  darling  child.  Pai^a 
wished  to  press  you  once  more  to  his  heart,''  are  the 
M'ords  ascribed  to  him.  If  so,  they  were  prophetic,  for 
he  was  seized  vsdth  illness  at  Innspruck,  where  he 
died,  and  they  never  saw  each  other  again. 

The  superintendence  of  her  vast  empire  occupied  a 
far  larger  share  of  his  widow  Maria  Theresa's  atten- 
tion than  the  education  of  her  children.  But  as  Marie 
Antoinette  grew  in  beauty  and  attractiveness,  the  em- 
press-queen, her  mother,  saw  a  prospect  of  cementing 
more  closely  her  recent  alliance  with  Prance.  For  two 
centuries  and  a  half  —  that  is,  from  the  day  when 
Charles  Y.  of  Spain  j)revailed  over  the  French  King, 
Francis  I.,  in  the  competition  for  the  imperial  crown, 
the  EmjDeror  of  Germany  and  the  King  of  France  had 


MARRIAGE  TO   THE   DAUPHIN.  551 

been  hostile  to  each  other.  The  very  first  years  of  her 
own  reign  had  been  embittered  by  the  union  of  France 
with  Prussia,  in  a  Avar  whicli  had  deprived  her  of  an 
important  province,  and  she  regarded  it  as  a  master 
stroke  of  dii)lomacy  that  she  had  succeeded  in  v^^inning 
over  the  French  ministry  from  the  friendshij)  of  Fred- 
erick of  Prussia  to  her  own.  This  friendship  she  de- 
sired to  strengthen  by  a  marriage  bet^veen  Marie 
Antoinette  and  the  Dauphin  of  France,  grandson  of 
the  reigning  King,  Louis  XV.  For  this  j)urpose  she 
made  proficiency  in  French  the  chief  aim  in  the  young- 
girl's  education.  Two  French  actors  were  brought  to 
Tienna  to  teach  the  young  princess  elocution,  and  the 
Abbe  de  Yermand,  a  learned  man,  whose  character  is 
variously  regarded  by  different  biographers,  was  sent 
from  Paris  to  be  her  resident  tutor  and  director  in  all 
matters.  Metastasis  taught  her  Italian  ;  and  Gluck, 
then  recognized  as  one  of  the  chief  musicians  of  his 
time,  gave  her  lessons  on  the  har]3sichord. 

Marie  Antoinette  was  perhaps  too  fond  of  play  to 
apply  steadily  to  her  studies.  At  any  rate,  she  her- 
self regretted  sincerely  in  after  life  her  own  w^ant  of 
literary  information  and  culture,  and  endeavored  to 
make  up  her  deficiencies  by  taking  lessons  in  more 
than  one  accomplishment  during  the  first  j'ears  of  her 
residence  at  Versailles.  She  felt,  wdien  Dauphiness, 
and  afterward  Queen,  her  inferiority  in  culture  to  the 
ladies  of  the  old  French  noblesse,  and  once  exclaimed 
sadly,  "  What  a  resource  amid  the  casualties  of  life  is 
a  well-cultivated  mind  I  One  can  then  be  one's 
own  companion,  and  find  society  in  one'  s  owti 
thoughts." 


552         MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

Sach,  then,  was  Marie  Antoinette,  when,  at  the  age  of 
fifteen,  she  went  to  Paris  and  became  the  bride  of  the 
Dauphin,  afterward  Louis  XVI.  The  wedding  took 
place  on  the  16th  of  May,  1770,  and  was  a  matter  of 
rejoicing  to  the  bride's  family,  and  of  satisfaction  to  the 
French  King,  Louis  XV.,  who  was  much  pleased  with 
the  frank  and  artless  vivacity  of  his  Viennese  grand- 
daughter-in-law.  On  the  day  on  which  she  set  out 
from  Vienna,  her  mother  had  written  the  following 
letter  to  her  son-in-law  elect : 

"  Your  bride,  my  dear  Dauphin,  has  just  left  me.  I  do  hope  that 
she  will  cause  3'ou  happiness.  I  have  brought  her  up  with  the  de- 
sign that  she  should  do  so,  because  I  have  for  some  time  foreseen  that 
she  would  share  your  destiny. 

"  I  have  inspired  her  with  an  eager  desire  to  do  her  duty  to  you, 
with  a  tender  attachment  to  your  person,  with  a  resolution  to  be  at- 
tentive to  think  and  do  everything  which  may  please  you.  I  have 
also  been  most  careful  to  enjoin  upon  her  a  tender  devotion  toward  the 
Master  of  all  Sovereigns,  being  thoroughly  persuaded  that  we  are  but 
badly  providing  for  the  welfare  of  the  nations  which  are  intrusted  to 
us  when  we  fail  in  our  duty  to  Him  who  breaks  sceptres  and  over- 
throws thrones  according  to  His  pleasure. 

"  I  say,  then,  to  you,  my  dear  Dauphin,  as  I  say  to  my  daughter  : 
'  Cultivate  your  duties  toward  God.  Seek  to  cause  the  happiness  of 
the  people  over  whom  you  will  reign  (it  will  be  too  soon,  come  when 
it  may).  Love  the  king,  your  grandfather  ;  be  humane  like  him  ; 
be  always  accessible  to  the  imfortunate.  If  you  behave  in  this 
manner,  it  is  impossible  that  happiness  can  fail  to  be  your  lot.'  My 
daughter  will  love  you,  I  am  certain,  because  I  know  her.  But  the 
more  that  I  answer  to  you  for  her  affection  and  for  her  anxiety  to 
please  you,  the  more  earnestly  do  I  entreat  you  to  vow  to  her  the 
most  sincere  attachment. 

"  Farewell,  my  dear  Dauphiu.  May  you  be  happy.  I  am  bathed 
in  tears. ' ' 


WEDDING    FESTIVITIES   IN   PARIS.  553 

Those  who  are  superstitious  will  no  doubt  deem  an 
accident  that  occurred  during  the  prolonged  festivities 
of  the  wedding  a  providential  counterpart  to  the  storm 
and  the  Lisbon  earthquake  that  took  place  on  the  day 
of  the  bride's  birth.  The  30th  of  May  closed  a  succes- 
sion of  balls  and  banquets  in  Paris  with  a  magnificent 
display  of  fireworks.  Three  sides  of  the  Place  Louis 
XV.  were  filled  up  with  pyramids  and  colonnades. 
"Here,"  says  a  recent  historian,  "dolphins  darted 
out  many-colored  flames  from  their  ever-open  mouths. 
There  rivers  of  fire  poured  forth  cascades  spangled 
with  all  the  variegated  brilliancy  with  which  the  chem- 
ist's art  can  embellish  the  work  of  the  ]^yrotechnist. 
The  centre  was  occupied  with  a  gorgeous  temple  of 
Hymen,  which  seemed  to  lean  for  support  on  the  well- 
known  statue  of  the  king,  in  front  of  which  it  was 
constructed  ;  and  which  was,  as  it  were,  to  be  carried 
up  to  the  skies  by  above  three  thousand  rockets  and 
fireballs,  into  which  it  was  intended  to  dissolve.  The 
whole  square  was  packed  with  spectators,  the  joedes- 
trians  in  front,  the  carriages  in  the  rear,  when  one  of 
the  explosions  set  fire  to  a  portion  of  the  platform  on 
which  the  different  figures  had  been  constructed.  At 
first  the  increase  of  the  blaze  was  regarded  only  as  an 
ingenious  surprise  on  the  part  of  the  artist.  But  soon 
it  became  clear  that  the  conflagration  M^as  undesigned 
and  real  ;  panic  succeeded  to  delight,  and  the  terror- 
stricken  crowd,  seeing  themselves  surrounded  with 
flames,  began  to  make  frantic  efforts  to  escape  from 
the  danger  ;  there  was  only  one  side  of  the  square  un- 
inclosed,  and  that  was  blocked  up  by  carriages.  The 
result  may  be  imagined.     At  the  lowest  estimate,  six 


554        MARIE    ANTOINETTE    AS    WIFE   AND    MOTHER. 

hnndi'ed  were  killed  and  manv  moiv  irrievoiislv 
wounded.  The  DaupMn  and  Daujihiness  had  been 
spectators  of  the  awful  scene  from  a  distance,  while 
drivinir  to  the  spot  in  their  carria£?e.  Thev  srave  theii* 
entire  month's  income  for  the  relief  of  the  stiff erei-s. 

Even  the  very  day  of  her  marriage  has  its  untoward 
incident.  The  only  blood-ivlation  of  Maiie  Antoinette 
who  was  at  Versailles  ar  the  time  was  the  Princess  of 
Lorraine,  and  the  king  gave  this  lady  precedence  of  the 
nobilirv.  placinir  her  next  in  the  order  of  dancinsr  to 
the  roval  famUv.  This  irave  snch  offence  to  the  French 
X^eers  and  peeresses  that  they  held  a  consultation  and 
resolved  to  Absent  themselves,  and  the  king  had  to 
send  a  command  for  their  attendance. 

The  earlier  vears  of  the  maiiied  life  of  Marie  Antoi- 
nette  were  frivolous  and  gay  rather  than  happy.  Her 
husband  treated  her  with  respectful  coldness,  for  his 
nature' was  not  ardent  or  demonstrative  of  affection- 
He  had  no  idea  of  wounding  her  feelings,  but  he  did 
not  seek  her  society  in  private,  and  had  no  perception 
that  marriage  was  to  her,  as  a  warm-hearted  woman, 
anythiug  more  than  the  matter  of  convenience  and  ac- 
quiescence that  it  was  to  himsell  Married  at  the  early 
aee  of  fourteen  vears  and  a  half  to  a  vouth  onlv  a  few 
years  older  than  hersell  the  pair  were  childless  for 
eight  and  a  half  years  after  their  union.  Louis  XT. 
died  on  the  10th  of  May.  1774,  and  the  Dauphin  and 
Xhiuphiness  became  King  and  Queen  of  France.  There 
seemed  little  prospect  of  a  family,  and  this  disappoint- 
ment was  keenly  felt  by  the  queen.  Her  natural  de- 
sire for  children  of  her  own  was  srreatlv  increased  when 
her  sister-in-hiw,  the  Countess  d'Artois.  presented  her 


MARIE  ANTOINETTE  AND   CHILDREN. 


HER  CHARACTERISTICS.  557 

husband  with  a  son.  She  treated  the  young  mother 
with  sisterly  affection,  but  she  could  not  restrain  her 
feelings  on  the  subject  when  writing  to  her  mother,  and 
she  expressed  candidly  the  extreme  pain  she  suffered 
"  at  thus  seeing  an  heu-  to  the  throne  who  was  not  her 
own  child. "  She  probably  felt  more  keenly  than  be- 
fore the  coldness  of  her  husband,  and  at  Little  Trianon, 
the  pavilion  he  had  given  her  at  her  own  request, 
about  a  mile  from  the  palace  of  Versailles,  she  sought 
to  quench  her  gi'ief  in  a  constant  whirl  of  pleasurable 
excitement. 

Her  open  and  confiding  disposition  made  her  the 
easy  dupe  of  designing  persons,  against  whom  her  true 
friends  cautioned  her  in  vain.  Malicious  construc- 
tions were  put  upon  her  innocent  frankness  of  word 
and  deed,  but  no  woman's  character  ever  shone  forth 
in  clearer  purity  from  the  misty  atmosphere  of  tempta- 
tion. Slie  was  unguarded  and  self-vdlled,  but  as  she 
was  always  forgiving  to  her  enemies  and  faithful  to  her 
friends,  so  to  her  husband  she  was  a  chaste  and  honor- 
able wife.  She  complains  occasionally  in  her  letters 
of  his  indifference  to  her  society,  and  that  he  cared  for 
nothing  but  hunting  and  mechanical  employments. 
She  even  speaks  of  him  as  "  The  poor  man,"  whom  she 
did  as  she  pleased  with,  but  all  this  was  the  petulant 
expression  of  a  young  wife' s  disappointment,  that  she 
who  was  admired  and  beloved  by  so  many  should  be 
an  object  of  indifference  to  one,  and  that  one  her  hus- 
band. 

Little  did  the  yearning  but  giddy  young  queen  im- 
agine that  she  was  helping  by  her  extravagance  and 
prodigality  to  bring  on  that  revolution  of  which  hatred 


658        MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

to  rank  and  wealth  was  the  spark  that  was  to  consume 
herself  and  her  husband  and  all  her  dearest  friends. 
Especially  imprudent  was  her  dislike  to  Turgot,  the 
comptroller-general  of  finance,  because  he  gently  tried 
to  check  her  lavish  expenditures  on  her  favorites.  She 
persuaded  the  young  king  to  dismiss  him,  and  suc- 
ceeded the  more  readily,  as  neither  Louis  nor  herself 
had  the  least  misgiving  as  to  the  right  of  sovereigns  to 
spend  as  much  of  the  people's  money  as  they  pleased. 
"  What,"  said  Louis  XYI.,  on  one  occasion  to  this  up- 
right minister  of  state,  who  was  urging  him  to  refuse 
an  utterly  unwarrantable  application  for  a  pension — 
"  What  are  a  thousand  crowns  a  year  ?■'  "  Sire,"  re- 
plied Turgot,  "  they  are  the  taxation  of  a  village.'' 
This  prudent  counsellor,  had  he  been  listened  to  on 
other  occasions  as  he  was  on  this  particular  one,  and 
had  he  retained  his  thankless  office,  might  have 
averted  the  impending  danger. 

In  a  letter  to  her  mother,  dated  May  16th,  1778, 
Marie  Antoinette  alludes  to  the  quarrel  pending 
between  Austria  and  Prussia,  to  the  action  of  the  king 
regarding  it,  to  his  warmer  kindness  to  herself,  and 
to  the  hope  she  entertained  that  she  will  soon  be  a 
mother,  "  In  other  respects,  and  especially  in  my 
present  condition,  he  (her  husband)  behaves  most  ad- 
mirably, and  is  most  attentive  to  me.  I  protest  to  you, 
my  dear  mamma,  that  my  heart  would  be  torn  by  the 
idea  that  you  could  for  a  moment  suspect  his  good- will 
in  what  has  been  done.  No  ;  it  is  the  terrible  weak- 
ness of  his  ministers,  and  his  own  great  want  of  self- 
reliance,  which  does  all  the  mischief,  and  I  am  sure 
that  if  he  would  never  act  but  on  his  own  judgment, 


BIRTH   OF   A   PRINCESS.  559 

every  one  would  see  his  honesty,  his  correctness  of 
feeling,  and  his  tact,  which  at  present  they  are  far  from 
appreciating." 

Her  joy  at  the  prospect  of  having  a  child  was  fully 
shared  by  her  husband.  All  his  coldness  and  apathy 
seemed  to  vanish,  and  he  wrote  himself  both  to  her 
mother  and  her  brother  Joseph,  the  Emperor.  The 
news  created  equal  joy  at  Paris  and  Vienna,  and  the 
poor  young  queen  showed  her  grateful  sense  of  happi- 
ness by  liberal  gifts  to  the  poor,  and  by  founding  a  hos- 
pital for  women  in  a  similar  condition  to  her  own.  On 
the  19th  of  December,  1778,  she  gave  birth  to  a  prin- 
cess, who  was  named  Maria  Theresa,  in  honor  of  her 
imperial  grandmother,  and  who  became  in  due  time  the 
IMadame  Royale  of  the  revolution  and  the  Duchess 
d'  Angouleme,  when  the  sorrows  of  her  young  life  were 
recompensed  by  long  years  of  hapi)iness  and  peace. 
After  the  loss  of  her  j)arents  and  her  beloved  aunt, 
Madame  Elizabeth,  she  was  at  last  j^itied  and  released 
by  the  Parisian  bloodhounds,  and  permitted  to  seek 
the  protection  of  her  mother's  family  in  Vienna,  her 
uncle  being  Emperor.  She  alone  of  the  four  children 
of  Marie  Antoinette  lived  to  maturity  and  a  good  old 
age. 

"  Boys  will  come  after  girls,"  wrote  Maria  Theresa 
to  her  daughter.  The  birth  of  the  princess  came  near 
being  the  death  of  the  queen.  By  the  barbarous  cus- 
tom of  that  time  in  France,  every  one,  even  the  rabble, 
who  could  gain  an  entrance  into  the  chamber,  was  ad- 
mitted to  be  witness  of  a  royal  birth.  The  heat  was 
so  intense  that  the  queen  became  insensible  and  had  to 
be  bled  in  the  foot.     The  king  rushed  to  the  windows. 


560        MARIE   ANTOINETTE    AS    WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

and  with  all  his  strength  got  them  open.  His  was  the 
voice  that  whispered  tenderly  to  her  that  she  had  been 
delivered  of  a  daughter.  She  herself  was  not  disaj)- 
pointed.  When  the  nurse  brought  her  the  babe,  she 
pressed  it  to  her  bosom  and  said  :  ' '  Poor  little  thing  ; 
you  are  not  what  was  desired,  but  you  shall  not  be  the 
less  dear  to  me.  A  son  would  have  belonged  to  the 
state  ;  you  will  be  my  own  :  you  shall  have  all  my 
care,  you  shall  share  my  happiness  and  sweeten  my 
vexations."  Besides  the  gifts  to  the  poor  and  the 
hospital  which  were  made  before  the  birth,  the  happy 
mother  now  sent  large  sums  of  money  to  the  prisons  to 
release  poor  debtors,  gave  dowries  to  one  hundred 
poor  maidens,  applied  to  the  chief  officers  of  the  army 
and  navy  to  send  her  a  list  of  veterans  worthy  of  reward, 
and  to  the  clergy  of  Paris  for  the  names  of  worthy  ob- 
jects for  her  bounty.  She  also  settled  pensions  on  a 
number  of  poor  children  who  were  born  on  the  same 
day  as  the  princess,  one  of  whom,  who  owed  her  educa- 
tion to  this  pension,  became  known  to  fame  as  Madame 
Mars,  the  greatest  of  comic  actresses  in  Paris. 

In  the  spring  of  1780  Marie  Antoinette  was  shocked 
by  the  news  of  her  mother's  death.  They  had  been 
much  attached  to  each  other  since  Marie  became  a 
queen,  and  had  corresponded  regularly  upon  impor- 
tant subjects.  Maria  Theresa  gave  far  more  prudent 
advice  to  her  daughter  than  did  the  haughty  Catharine 
of  Russia,  who  once  wrote  to  her  that  kings  and  queens 
should  do  as  they  pleased  and  pursue  their  own  plans, 
regardless  of  the  interests  of  their  dogs  of  subjects. 
On  the  morning  of  October  22d,  1782,  a  son  and  heir 
to  the  throne  blessed  the  love  of  Louis  XVI.  and  Marie 


THE   YOUNG   DAUPHIN,  561 

Antoinette.  Tlie  king,  whose  affection  for  her  had 
steadily  grown  in  intensity  since  she  began  to  have 
children,  would  not  allow  her  life  to  be  endangered 
this  time  by  a  crowd  of  strangers  in  her  apartments. 
He  forbade  any  one  but  himself  to  announce  to  her  the 
sex  of  the  child,  and  it  was  with  a  heart  full  of  joy  and 
j)ride  that  he  told  her  that  their  hopes  of  an  heir  were 
fulfilled.  Then  he  called  to  the  Princess  de  Guimence, 
who  was  then  governess  of  the  royal  nursery,  and  who 
was  exhibiting  the  child  to  witnesses  in  the  antecham- 
ber, and  who  now  advanced  at  his  summons  and  said, 
"  Your  Majesty,  the  Dauphin  of  France  begs  to  be  ad- 
mitted.'' The  mother,  remembering  no  more  her 
anguish  for  joy  that  "a  man,"  and  he  the  heir  to  a 
kingdom,  "  was  born  into  the  world,"  pressed  the  in- 
fant to  her  bosom.  But  she  did  not  forget  her  former 
thought  on  the  birth  of  the  princess,  and  after  she  had 
traced  some  points  in  the  infant's  features  which  re- 
sembled those  of  his  father,  she  returned  him  to  the 
governess,  saying,  "Take  him;  he  belongs  to  the 
state  ;  but  my  daughter  is  still  mine."  Then  the  king 
himself  carried  his  little  son  to  the  window  and  showed 
him  to  the  crowd,  who  rent  the  air  with  acclamations, 
as  in  a  few  years  thev  were  to  rend  it  with  curses  and 
insults.  ''  Uneasy  lies  the  head  that  wears  a  crown." 
The  child  was  not  destined  to  liye.  The  Dauphin, 
whose  sad  lot  and  early  death  from  neglect  and  ill-treat- 
ment form  one  of  the  tragedies  of  that  awful  series, 
was  Marie  Antoinette's  third  child,  not  yet  born.  The 
elder  son  and  second  child  was  sickly,  and  had  spinal 
complaint  from  his  birth.  He  had  no  stamina  to  sup- 
port him  through  the  ordinary  ailments  of  children. 


562        MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE    AND   MOTHER. 

and  he  died  on  June  4tli,  1789,  when  not  yet  seven 
years  old.  On  the  27th  of  March,  1785,  the  future  des- 
olate and  slowly  murdered  Dauphin  came  into  the 
world,  which  was  for  him  a  j^rison  and  a  slaughter- 
house, a  habitation  of  cruelty,  and  the  grave  of  all  his 
young  affections.  The  reader  of  history  thanks  the 
justice  of  a  too  inert  and  crime-permitting  Providence, 
that  his  keeper,  Simon  the  shoemaker,  who  starved 
him  and  beat  him  and  kept  him  in  filth  and  darkness 
for  the  last  three  years  of  his  young  life,  was  carried 
to  the  guillotine  before  his  child-victim's  death. 

What  a  contrast  was  his  brief  life  to  the  day  when 
Marie  Antoinette  wrote  to  her  brother  the  Emperor 
that  the  second  son  "  had  all  that  his  elder  brother 
wanted  ;  he  was  a  thorough  peasant's  child,  tall,  stout 
and  ruddy."  His  father  had  taken  him  in  his  arms, 
called  him  "  his  little  Xorman,"  and  saying  that  the 
name  alone  would  bring  him  hax3j)iness,  created  him 
Duke  of  Normandy.  As  the  roj  al  mother  i)aid  a  visit 
to  Paris,  to  return  thanks  for  this  child  of  future  sor- 
rows in  the  churches  of  Notre  Dame  and  in  St.  Gene- 
vieve, the  citizens  were  so  enthusiastic  in  their  affec- 
tion for  her  that  they  could  hardly  be  prevented  from 
unharnessing  her  horses  and  dragging  her  coach  in 
triumph  through  the  streets.  Such  is  the  mutability 
of  human  passions  and  the  fickleness  of  "  the  sover- 
eign people"  ! 

The  Princess  Soj^hie  Helene  Beatrix  was  the  fourth 
and  last  child  of  Louis  XYI.  and  Marie  Antoinette. 
She  was  born  on  the  9th  of  July,  1786,  was  a  sickly 
child,  and  died  on  the  9th  of  June,  1787,  aged  eleven 
months. 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  DIAMOND  NECKLACE.  503 

We  have  taken  tlie  pains  to  be  thus  exact  in  enumer- 
ating the  children  of  Marie  Antoinette,  because  some  of 
the  popular  lives  of  the  queen  published  in  this  country 
are  exceedingly  inaccurate  in  their  accounts  of  them. 
The  "  History  of  Marie  Antoinette,"  by  John  S.  C.  Ab- 
bott, for  instance,  contains  the  following  misstatement 
in  narrating  the  episode  of  the  diamond  necklace,  which 
brought  so  much  misery  and  calumny  to  the  unfortu- 
nate queen,  whose  name  had  been  forged  by  a  con- 
spirator in  league  with  the  Countess  de  la  Mothe,  to  a 
letter  to  Cardinal  Rohan,  authorizing  its  jDurchase  and 
delivery  by  him  to  that  notorious  woman  :  "  Matters 
continued  in  this  state  for  some  time,  until  the  baj)- 
tism  of  the  Duke  d'Angouleme,  Marie  Antoinette's 
infant  son.  The  king  made  his  idolized  boy  a  present 
of  a  diamond  epaulette  and  buckles,  which  he  pur- 
chased of  Boehmer"  [the  crown  jeweller,  who  had  been 
swindled  out  of  the  necklace  which  the  queen  had 
positively  declined  to  purchase,  and  which,  unknown 
to  her,  had  subsequently  been  delivered  to  the  Cardinal 
upon  the  strength  of  the  forged  order  from  her],  "  and 
directed  him  to  deliver  to  the  queen.  As  the  Jeweller 
presented  them,  he  slii)ped  into  the  queen's  hand  a 
letter,  in  the  form  of  a  petition,  containing  the  follow- 
ing expression  :  '  I  am  happy  to  see  your  Majesty  in 
the  possession  of  the  finest  diamonds  in  Europe  ;  and 
I  entreat  your  Majesty  not  to  forget  me.' "  The  re- 
quest referred,  of  course,  to  the  iDayment  for  the  neck- 
lace, which  the  queen  had  never  received  nor  ordered 
to  be  purchased,  but  which  the  infamous  Countess  de 
la  Mothe  had  obtained  by  fraud  and  forgery,  whether 
with  or  without  the  connivance  of  the  Cardinal  Rohan 


564         MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

can  never  be  positively  known.     But   the  statement 
that  the  infant  Duke  of  Angouleme  was  the  son  of 
Louis  XVI.   and  Marie    Antoinette  is  a  conspicuous 
instance  of  the  inaccuracy  and  carelessness  with  which 
histories  are  written  to   sell.     The  Duke,   w^ho  after- 
ward became  the  husband  of  Maria  Theresa,  the  eldest 
child  and  daughter  of  the  king  and  queen,  w^as  the 
very  infant  whose  possible  reversion  to  the  crown  we 
saw  Marie  Antoinette  lamenting  before  she  herself  had 
any  prospect  of  a  family.     He  afterw^ard  became  Dau- 
i:)hin  of  France,  when  the  Count  d'Artois  succeeded  to 
the  throne  as  Charles  X.,  and  the  Duke  and  Duchess 
were  residents,  in  their  exile  from  France,  of  Holy  wood 
Palace,    near    Edinburgh,    formerly   the   residence   of 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots.     It  was  the  Duchess,  not  the 
Duke,  who  was  Marie  Antoinette's  child,  and  a  modern 
French  writer  says  of  this  queen  :   "  Yes,  she  was  the 
mother  of  Louis  XYIL,  a  martyr"  [meaning  the  Dau- 
phin, w±o  died  at  the  age  of  ten,  as  w^  e  have  seen,  from 
long  confinement  and  starvation,  and  who  would  be 
legitimately  so  entitled  after  his  father  was  beheaded] 
"  of  Maria  Theresa  of  France,  Duchess  of  Angouleme, 
a  saint — she  w^ho  had  them  brouglit  up  in  the  com- 
jmny  of  Madame  Elizabeth,  an  angel  upon  earth,  was 
a  great  mother  ;    and  not  only  in  prosperous   days, 
when  happiness   makes  virtue  easier — she  was  so  in 
the  midst  of  those  unheard-of  miseries  which  tauglit 
mankind  (in  the  w^ords  of  Chateaubriand)  what  tears 
might  be  contained  in  the  eyes  and  heart  of  a  queen." 
We  have  Marie  Antoinette  before  us  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  Revolution  as  the  mother  of  two  children 
only,  the  Princess  Royal,  now  nine,  and  the  Dauphin, 


LETTER  FROM  MARIE   ANTOINETTE.  565 

seven  years  old,  the  two  others  having  died.  She 
made  it  her  happiness  and  her  duty  to  study  the  dis- 
iwsitions  of  the  young  prince  and  i)rincess,  and  in  a 
letter  to  Madame  de  Tourzel,  when  apijointing  her  gov- 
erness to  the  Dauphin,  dated  July  25th,  1789,  the 
anxious  mother  writes  : 

"  My  son  is  four  years  and  four  months  old,  all  but 
two  days.  I  say  nothing  of  his  size  nor  of  his  general 
appearance ;  it  is  only  necessary  to  see  him.  His 
health  has  always  been  good,  but  even  in  his  cradle  we 
perceived  that  his  nerves  were  very  delicate.  .  .  Any 
noise  to  which  he  is  not  accustomed  frightens  him. 
For  instance,  he  is  afraid  of  dogs,  because  he  once 
heard  one  bark  close  to  him  ;  and  I  have  never  obliged 
him  to  see  one,  because  I  believe  that  as  his  reason 
grows  his  fears  will  x:)ass  away.  Like  all  children 
who  are  strong  and  healthy,  he  is  very  giddy,  volatile, 
and  passionate  ;  but  he  is  a  good  child,  tender,  and 
even  caressing,  when  his  giddiness  does  not  run  away 
with  him.  He  has  a  great  sense  of  what  is  due  to 
himself,  which,  if  he  be  well  managed,  one  may  some 
day  turn  to  his  good.  Till  he  is  entirely  at  his  ease 
A\'ith  any  one,  he  can  restrain  himself,  and  even  stifle 
his  impatience  and  his  inclination  to  anger,  in  order  to 
apjjear  gentle  and  amiable.  He  is  admirably  faithful 
when  once  he  has  promised  anything,  but  he  is  very  in- 
discreet ;  he  is  thoughtless  in  repeating  anything  that  he 
has  heard  ;  and  often  without  in  the  least  intending  to 
tell  stories,  he  adds  circumstances  which  his  own  im- 
agination has  put  into  his  head.  This  is  his  greatest 
fault,  and  it  is  one  for  which  he  must  be  corrected. 
However,  taken  altogether,  I  say  again,  he  is  a  good 


o6G         MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS    WIFE   AND  MOTHER. 

child  ;  and  by  treating  Mm  with  allowance,  and  at  the 
same  time  with  firmness,  which  must  be  kept  clear  of 
severity,  w^e  shall  always  be  able  to  do  all  that  we  can 
wish  with  him.  But  severity  would  revolt  him,  for  he 
has  a  great  deal  of  resolution  for  his  age.  To  give  you 
an  instance  :  from  his  very  earliest  childhood  the  word 
pardon  has  always  offended  him.  He  will  say  and  do 
all  that  you  can  wish  when  he  is  wrong,  but  as  for  the 
word  pardon,  he  never  pronounces  it  without  tears 
and  infinite  difficultT. 

"  I  have  always  accustomed  my  children  to  have 
great  confidence  in  me,  and  when  they  have  done 
wTong,  to  tell  me  themselves  ;  and  then,  when  I  scold 
them,  this  enables  me  to  appear  pained  and  afflicted  at 
what  they  have  done  rather  than  angry.  I  have  ac- 
customed them  to  regard  'yes'  or  'no,'  once  uttered 
by  me,  as  kre vocable  ;  but  I  always  give  them  reasons 
for  my  decision,  suitable  to  their  ages,  to  prevent 
them  thinking  that  my  decision  comes  from  ill-humor. 
My  son  cannot  read,  and  he  is  very  slow  at  learning  ; 
but  he  is  too  giddy  to  apply.  He  has  no  pride  in  his 
heart,  and  I  am  very  anxious  that  he  should  continue 
to  feel  so.  Our  children  always  learn  soon  enough 
what  they  are.  He  is  very  fond  of  his  sister,  and  has 
a  good  heart.  Whenever  anything  gives  him  pleas- 
ure, whether  it  be  the  going  anywhere  or  that  any  one 
gives  him  anything,  his  first  movement  always  is  to 
ask  that  his  sister  may  have  the  same.  He  is  light- 
hearted  by  nature.  It  is  necessary  for  his  health  that 
he  should  be  a  great  deal  in  the  open  air  ;  and  I  think 
it  is  better  to  let  him  play  and  w^ork  in  the  garden  on 
the  terrace,  than  to  take  him  longer  walks.     The  exer- 


"THE   YOUNG   CAPET."  567 

cise  which  children  take  in  running  about  and  inlaying 
in  the  open  air  is  much  more  healthy  than  forcing 
them  to  walk,  which  often  makes  their  backs  ache." 

Much  of  this  letter  may  seem  j)rim  and  too  i:)recise 
to  us.  It  seems  odd  for  a  mother  to  expect  an  old 
head  upon  the  shoulders  of  a  boy  of  four,  and  to  talk 
of  his  being  indiscreet  and  unreserved  as  faults  to  be 
corrected.  But  it  shows  that  her  mind  was  bent  on 
training  him  not  as  a  common  child,  but  as  one  who 
was  heir  to  the  throne  of  a  great  and  illustrious 
nation.  She  is  minute  for  fear  the  governess  should 
be  unobservant  or  negligent,  and  she  is  candid  both  as 
to  the  faults  and  merits  of  her  boy.  The  letter  proves 
her  to  have  been  a  good,  a  prudent,  and  a  watchful 
mother.  Poor  little  Louis !  a  far  different  fate 
awaited  him  from  what  she  fondly  hoped  for.  In 
1793  he  was  torn  from  this  good  mother  forever.  The 
Committee  of  Public  Safety  decreed  that  the  young 
Capet,  as  they  called  him,  should  be  placed  in  solitary 
confinement,  under  the  charge  of  the  brutal  shoemaker 
Simon,  who  had  private  orders  to  get  rid  of  him  by 
degrees.  It  was  night  when  the  officers  of  the  Com- 
mittee came  to  carry  him  away.  His  mother  flung  her 
arms  around  him,  and  resisted  all  efforts  to  tear  him  from 
her,  exclaiming,  '•'■  Tuez  moi  done  (Tabord'^ — "Then 
kill  me  first."  They  only  prevailed  by  threatening  to 
kill  the  child,  when  she  relaxed  her  hold  and  sank  ex- 
hausted with  the  struggle.  The  unhappy  Dauphin 
was  shut  up  for  nearly  two  years  before  his  merciful 
release  by  death,  in  solitude,  without  employment, 
Avithout  human  sympathy  or  kindness,  denied  even 
the  light  and  air.     When  the  door  was  opened  it  was 


568        MARIE   AiS'TOI^;ETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

to  place  a  flagon  of  dirty  water  and  a  crust  of  bread 
for  liim.  He  was  never  washed,  and  his  clothes  and 
linen  were  never  changed.  It  was  a  slow  death  in  a 
living  tomb.  His  limbs  became  rigid,  his  mind  vacant 
and  insensible.  After  his  keeper  was  executed  for  his 
other  crimes,  his  persecutors  relented,  but  it  was  too 
late.  The  celebrated  physician,  Dersault,  was  sent  to  his 
lowly  bedside.  His  mother's  image — that  mother  from 
whom  he  had  been  so  cruelly  separated  two  years  be- 
fore, when  she  was  doomed  to  the  guillotine,  but  whom 
he  was  now  perhaps  to  rejoin  in  everlasting  reunion 
— was  the  last  that  filled  his  dying  vision.  The  physi- 
cian asked  him  if  he  suffered  much.  "  Oh,  yes,  I  suffer 
still,"  he  answered,  "but  much  less  than  I  did,  the 
music  is  so  beautiful.''  "  On  what  side  do  you  hear 
this  music?"  "There,  on  high;  listen!  listen  I" 
Then,  after  a  brief  silence,  his  eyes  kindled  with  the 
heavenly  light,  and  he  exclaimed,  with  the  rapture  of 
an  enfranchised  and  departing  soul,  "  Amidst  all  the 
voices,  I  have  recognized  that  of  my  mother."  He 
waved  his  hand,  wafted  a  kiss  to  her,  and  sank  back  dead. 
The  opening  of  the  year  1789  was  the  beginning  of 
troubles  for  Marie  Antoinette.  Hitherto  she  had 
been  alternately  lauded  and  insulted  by  the  artisans  of 
Paris.  Now  the  very  canaille  and  refuse  of  humanity 
were  to  fling  their  dirt  at  her.  Hers  is  one  of  those 
characters  that  are  Avashed  and  made  white  by  passing- 
through  great  tri])ulation.  All  that  was  frivolous  and 
extravagant  in  her  conduct  disappeared  forever,  and 
the  heroic  queen  was  only  less  admirable  than  the  de- 
voted.  wife  and  mother.  The  vilest  slanders  were  cir- 
culated against  the  queen,  one  of  them  being  that  she 


MUTTERIXaS  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.  569 

had  a  mine  ready  to  blow  up  the  Parliament  of  Paris, 
or  National  Assembly.  On  the  14th  of  Juh"  the  cry 
"  To  the  Bastile  !"  was  echoed  from  mouth  to  mouth 
bv  a  drunken  mob  alone;  the  banks  of  the  Seine. 
This  was  on  the  third  day  of  the  insurrection,  and  they 
had  already  gained  X30ssession  of  the  city  gates  and  of 
the  Hotel  de  Yille,  with  the  municipal  chest  contain- 
ing three  millions  of  francs.  They  had  stormed  the 
Hotel  des  Invalides,  and  armed  themselves  with  thou- 
sands of  muskets  that  were  stored  there.  Now  thev 
stormed  the  ii'on  and  stone  forms  of  the  Bastile,  and 
murdered  the  governor  and  military  that  defended  it, 
who  had  been  taken  by  surprise  and  could  malie  little 
resistance.  At  midnight  couriers  arrived  at  Yersailles 
to  apprise  the  king  and  queen  of  the  terrible  aspect  of 
affairs. 

On  the  6th  of  October,  1789,  when  the  mob  insisted 
that  she  should  make  her  appearance,  she  came  forth 
on  the  balcony,  holding  the  Dauphin  with  one  hand 
and  the  Princess  Royal  with  the  other.  '''Point  d'en- 
f  ants'''' — "  No  children  !"  was  the  angry  cry.  She  led 
them  away,  and  reappeared  alone.  Even  the  insensate 
crowd  were  astonished  at  her  calmness  and  courage, 
and  with  true  French  fickleness  burst  into  rounds  of 
applause.  On  the  night  of  the  13th  of  April,  1790, 
the  night  for  which  Lafayette  had  given  warning  of  an 
attack  of  the  Tuileries,  the  king,  after  vainly  looking 
for  her  in  her  own  apartments,  found  her  in  the  Dau- 
phin's nursery,  holding  him  in  her  arms.  "  Madame,' ' 
said  Louis,  "  I  have  been  looking  for  you  everywhere, 
and  you  have  caused  me  much  uneasiness."  '' Su'e," 
replied  Marie  Antoinette,  "  I  am  at  my  i:)ost." 


570         MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

When  she  was  brought,  at  a  later  date,  before  the 
Revobitionary  tribunal,  Herbert,  the  public  prosecutor, 
accused  her  of  undermining,  the  morals  and  health  of 
the  Dauphin,  that  she  might  gain  an  undue  influence 
over  his  mind  as  he  grew  up.  A  charge  so  ridiculous 
against  a  mother  was  unworthy  of  her  serious  reply, 
but  she  answered,  with  dignity  and  self-possession, 
"  Je  croyais  que  la  nature  me  dispenderait  de  repon- 
dre  a  une  telle  imputation  ;  mais  j'en  appelle  au  C03ur 
de  toutes  les  meres  ici  presentes" — "  I  believed  that 
nature  would  dispense  me  from  replying  to  such  an  im- 
putation, but  I  appeal  against  it  to  the  heart  of  every 
mother  here  present." 

Had  Louis  XYI.  listened  to  the  advice  of  Marie  An- 
toinette after  the  taking  of  the  Bastile  and  the  slaugh- 
ter of  its  governor,  De  Launay,  and  the  garrison,  he 
might  even  yet  have  been  saved.  But  vacillation  was 
his  great  infirmity,  and  when  he  sat  brooding  and  said 
it  was  a  time  for  serious  deliberation,  it  was  to  no  pur- 
pose that  she  answered  that  it  was  rather  a  time  for 
promptness  in  action.  When  he  announced  to  the 
Assembly  that  he  had  ordered  the  withdrawal  of  the 
troops  from  the  capital,  she  earnestly  besought  him  to 
accomi:>any  them,  but  he  chose  rather  to  visit  Paris 
as  the  mob  demanded,  and  as  the  Ministerial  Council 
advised.  She  believed  he  would  be  assassinated  on 
the  road  or  in  the  city,  but,  even  so,  she  would  gladly 
have  gone  with  liim  had  she  not  known  that  her  pres- 
ence would  increase  his  danger.  It  cost  more  forti- 
tude for  her  to  remain  at  Versailles,  which  was 
already  threatened  with  an  attack.  As  he  set  out  she 
sat  with  her  children  in  a  private  room,  shedding  no 


VERSAILLES   ATTACKED.  571 

tears,  lest  the  knowledge  of  her  grief  should  add  to 
the  fears  of  her  attendants.  Her  carriages  were  kept 
in  readiness,  so  that  if  the  worst  news  came  she  might 
hasten  to  the  Assembly  and  claim  its  protection  for 
her  children.  "  They  will  never  let  him  return  !"  she 
mnrmnred  sadly. 

When  Versailles  was  really  attacked,  Louis  tried  to 
induce. his  i^-ife  to  fly  with  the  children,  but  she  re- 
fused to  leave  her  husband,  declaring  that  her  place 
was  by  his  side,  and  that,  as  a  daughter  of  Maria 
Theresa  of  Austria,  she  had  no  fear  of  death.  It  was 
a  sorrowful  journey  which  the  king,  now  accompanied 
by  the  queen,  his  children,  his  sister  the  Princess 
Elizabeth,  and  his  brother  the  Count  de  Provence, 
took  back  to  Paris.  The  procession  was  painfully 
slow,  and  as  no  food  had  been  provided  for  the  journey 
the  little  Dauphin  cried  from  hunger.  The  good 
mother,  who  never  shed  a  selfish  tear,  wept  at  the 
sufferings  of  her  child.  She  begged  him  to  be  patient, 
and  the  little  fellow  ceased  complaining.  "  Mamma," 
he  said,  when  they  reached  the  Tuileries,  which  had 
been  neglected,  and  whose  chambers  were  dismantled, 
"how  bad  everything  looks  here  !  "  "  My  boy,"  she 
replied,  "  Louis  Quatorze  lived  here  comfortably 
enough."  The  king  announced  to  the  Assembly  that 
he  would  reside  in  Paris  for  the  future.  But  from  the 
hour  w-hen  they  left  A^ersailles,  the  queen  said  "  they 
were  undone  ;  they  were  being  dragged  off,  perhaps  to 
death."  Charles  I.  of  England  was  ever  before  her 
mind,  and  it  was  henceforth  with  a  foresight  of  the 
end  that  she  as  queen,  as  well  as  wife  and  mother, 
strove  to  maintain  her  hu.sband's  honor  and  her  son's 


572         MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

inlieritance.  She  preserved  lier  patience,  her  courage, 
and  her  dignity  unwavering,  till  she  laid  her  head 
upon  the  block,  and  long  after  all  hope  had  left  her 
heart. 

It  would  be  beside  our  purjDose  to  stain  oiir  pages 
with  the  nameless  and  inhuman  crimes  of  the  Reign 
of  Terror.  Let  us  cling  to  the  queen-woman,  true  and 
noble  to  the  last,  who  is  so  soon  to  leave  us.  A  little 
plot  of  ground  was  railed  off  in  the  garden  of  the  Tuil- 
eries  for  the  Dauphin's  amusement,  and  one  of  her 
favorite  recreations  was  to  watch  him  w^orking  at  the 
flower-beds  with  his  little  rake  and  hoe,  althongli 
neither  she  nor  he  were  left  for  a  moment  without 
the  grenadiers  of  the  city  guard,  who  watched  her  as 
though  she  were  a  criminal  already  condemned.  Pri- 
vacy and  rest  were  never  to  be  hers  again  in  this  world. 
*'  The  king,"  said  Mirabeau,  "  has  but  one  man  about 
him,  and  that  is  his  wife."  More  than  one  attempt 
was  made  to  murder  her.  "  If  my  death  only  secures 
the  throne  to  my  son,"  she  said,  "  I  shall  willingly 
die." 

Still,  for  the  sake  of  others,  she  would  gladly  have 
escaped  from  Paris.  She  urged  it  upon  the  king,  but 
he  alw^ays  hesitated  till  the  ojiportunity  was  gone. 
And  when,  in  the  sj)ring  of  1791,  they  wished  to  retire 
to  their  country  j^alace  at  St.  Cloud,  and  the  carriages 
were  at  the  gates  of  the  Tuileiies,  they  found  that  the 
guard  had  mutinied  and  closed  the  doors,  so  that  they 
had  to  return  to  their  own  apartments  as  prisoners. 
To  the  obstinacy  and  imprudence  of  the  king  in 
having  a  carriage  of  unusual  size  and  appearance  built 
for   them,    added  to   the   accident    which   caused   an 


LAST    APPEARANCE   IN    PUBLIC.  573 

hours  delay  upon  the  road,  the  failure  of  their  last 
attempt  at  tlight,  and  their  ignominious  capture  and 
return  to  Paris,  must  be  attributed.  Had  they  once 
passed  the  borders  of  France,  all  Europe  would  have 
given  them  a  safe  asylum. 

When,  at  a  later  date,  the  honnet  rouge  was  placed 
upon  the  head  of  the  captive  monarch,  a  young  man 
in  the  crowd  turned  upon  his  heel,  and  exclaimed  in 
disgust :  "  The  wretches  !  the  wretches  !  they  ought 
to  be  mown  down  by  grapeshot."  The  young  man 
was  ]S"apoleon  Bonaparte.  "Ah,  Madame,"  said 
Louis  to  Marie  Antoinette,  "  why  did  I  take  you  from 
your  country,  to  associate  you  with  the  ignominy  of 
such  a  day  as  this  !" 

The  fete  in  the  Champ  de  Mars,  on  the  14th  of 
July,  1792,  was  the  last  occasion  on  which  they  ap- 
l^eared  in  public,  except  on  the  day  when  each  of 
them  was  taken  alone  to  execution.  A  dagger-proof 
corset  had  been  prepared  for  the  queen,  but  she  re- 
fused to  wear  it.  "  If  they  assassinate  me,"  she  said, 
"  it  will  be  a  happy  event.  It  will  release  me  from  a 
life  of  sorrow,  and  may  save  my  husband  and  children 
from  a  cruel  death." 

Even  in  their  imprisonment  in  the  Temple  they  had 
at  least  for  a  time  the  consolation  of  each  other's 
society,  and  that  of  their  children  and  their  ever-faith- 
ful aunt,  the  king's  sister  Elizabeth.  But  they  were 
soon  separated,  and  worse  than  the  bitterness  of  death 
was  the  separation  of  the  wife  and  mother,  first  from 
her  husband,  then  from  each  of  her  children.  On  the 
11th  of  December,  1792,  the  mock  trial  of  the  king 
took  place.      On  the  21st  of  January,   1793,   he  met 


574        MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

death  like  a  man,  the  Abbe  Edgeworth,  uncle,  we  be- 
lieve, of  Maria  Edgeworth,  the  Irish  novelist,  attending 
him  on  the  scaffold,  and  as  the  axe  fell,  uttering  the 
benediction,  "  Son  of  Saint  Louis,  ascend  to  heaven  !'' 

Marie  Antoinette,  now  a  widow  still  young,  but  ■s\dth 
locks  white  as  snow  through  sorrow,  was  removed  to 
solitary  imprisonment  in  the  Conciergerie,  and  the  last 
inhuman  cruelty  that  can  be  inflicted  on  a  mother  fell 
upon  her  in  the  seizure  of  her  darling  son.  Dearly 
did  'she  love  him,  and  when,  while  they  were  yet 
together,  her  friends  proposed  another  plan  of  escape, 
she  refused  the  offer,  and  wrote  :  "  The  interest  of 
my  son  is  my  sole  guide  ;  and  whatever  happiness  I 
might  find  in  being  out  of  this  j)lace,  I  cannot  consent 
to  separate  myself  from  him.  ...  I  could  enjoy 
nothing  if  I  were  to  leave  my  children."  And  when, 
on  the  night  of  the  3d  of  July,  the  little  king  was 
sleeping,  and,  as  we  have  already  told,  was  snatched 
from  her  embrace,  the  last  words  which  the  unhapjiy 
child  of  misfortune  was  ever  to  hear  on  earth  from  his 
poor  mother' s  lips  were  these :  ' '  My  child,  they  are 
taking  you  from  me  ;  never  forget  the  mother  who 
loves  you  tenderly,  and  never  forget  God  !  Be  good, 
gentle,  and  honest,  and  your  father  will  look  do^vn  on 
you  from  heaven  and  bless  you  !"  And  then  she 
fainted  and  saw  his  face  no  more. 

To  the  Princess  Elizabeth,  her  true  sister  in  affliction, 
and  who  was  soon  to  share  the  same  fate,  she  wrote 
from  the  common  prison  in  which  she  was  herded  with 
the  lowest  felons,  her  last  letter,  dated  October  16th, 
4.30  A.:\r.,  in  which  she  said  : 

"It  is  to  you,  my  sister,  that  I  write  for  the  last 


LETTER   FROM   HER  PRISON.  575 

time.  I  have  just  been  condemned,  not  to  a  shameful 
death,  for  such  is  only  for  criminals,  but  to  go  and  re- 
join your  brother.  Innocent  like  him,  I  hope  to  show 
ihe  same  firmness  in  m}^  last  moments.  I  am  calm,  as 
one  is  when  one's  conscience  reproaches  one  with 
nothing.  I  feel  profound  sorrow  in  leaving  my  poor 
children  :  you  know  that  I  only  lived  for  them  and 
for  you,  my  good  and  tender  sister.  You  who  out  of 
love  have  sacrificed  everything  to  be  with  us,  in  what 
a  position  do  I  leave  you  !  I  have  learned  from  the 
I)roceedings  at  my  trial  that  my  daughter  was  sepa- 
rated from  you.  Alas  !  poor  child  ;  I  do  not  venture 
to  vrrite  to  her  ;  she  would  not  receive  my  letter.  I 
do  not  even  know  whether  this  will  reach  you.  Do 
you  receive  my  blessing  for  both  of  them.  I  hope 
that  one  day,  when  they  are  older,  they  may  be  able  to 
rejoin  you,  and  to  enjoy  to  the  full  your  tender  care. 
Let  them  both  think  of  the  lesson  which  I  have  never 
ceased  to  impress  upon  them,  that  the  i^rincijjles  and 
the  exact  performance  of  their  duties  are  the  chief 
foundation  of  life  ;  and  then  mutual  affection  and  con- 
fidence in  one  another  will  constitute  its  happiness. 
Let  my  daughter  feel  that  at  her  age  she  ought  always 
to  aid  her  broth.er  by  the  advice  which  her  greater  ex- 
l^erience  and  her  affection  may  inspire  her  to  give 
him.  And  let  my  son  in  his  turn  render  to  his  sister 
all  the  care  and  all  the  services  which  affection  can  in- 
spire. Le't  them,  in  short,  both  feel  that,  in  whatever 
positions  they  may  be  placed,  they  will  never  be  truly 
happy  but  through  their  union.  Let  them  follow  our 
example.  In  our  own  misfortunes,  how  much  comfort 
has  our  affection  for  one  another  afforded  us  !     And  in 


576         MARIE   A^'TOIXETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

times  of  ]iapj)iness,  we  have  enjoyed  that  doubly  from 
being  able  to  share  it  with  a  friend  ;  and  where  can 
one  find  friends  more  tender  and  more  united  than  in 
one's  own  family?  Let  my  son  never  forget  the  last 
words  of  his  father,  which  I  repeat  emphatically  :  let 
him  never  seek  to  avenge  our  deaths,  I  have  to  speak 
of  one  thing"  [referring  to  the  depositions  which  the 
captive  little  king  had  been  compelled  by  his  persecu- 
tors to  sign,  containing  accusations  against  his  aunt 
and  his  mother]  "  which  is  very  painful  to  my  heart ;  I 
know  how  much  pain  the  child  must  have  caused 
you.  Forgive  him,  my  dear  sister  ;  think  of  his  age, 
and  how  easy  it  is  to  make  a  child  say  whatever  one 
wishes,  especially  when  he  does  not  understand  it.  It 
will  come  to  pass  one  day,  I  hope,  that  he  will  better 
feel  the  value  of  your  kindness  and  of  your  tender 
affection  for  both  of  them.  ...  I  beg  pardon  of  all 
whom  I  know,  and  especially  of  you,  my  sister,  for  all 
the  vexations  which,  without  intending  it,  I  may  have 
caused  you.  I  pardon  all  my  enemies  the  evils  they 
have  done  me.  I  bid  farewell  to  my  aunts,  and  to  all 
my  brothers  and  sisters.  I  had  friends.  The  idea  of 
being  forever  separated  from  them  and  from  all  their 
troubles  is  one  of  the  greatest  sorrows  that  I  suffer  in 
dying.  Let  them  at  least  know  that  to  my  latest 
moment  I  thought  of  them. 

"  Farewell,  my  good  and  tender  sister.  May  this 
letter  reach  you.  Think  always  of  me  ;  I  embrace 
you  with  all  my  heart,  as  I  do  my  poor,  dear  chil- 
dren. My  God,  how  heart-rending  it  is  to  leave  them 
forever  !     Farewell !  farewell !" 

Her  apprehensions  proved  well  founded.     Tlie  letter 


HER   LAST   HOURS.  577 

never  reached  her  sister-in-law,  but  fell  into  the  hands 
of  Fouguier,  who  preserved  it  among  his  special 
X)apers.  Had  one  spark  of  hnmanity  survived  in  the 
monsters  of  the  Reign  of  Terror,  they  would  have  re- 
spected the  doomed  j)risoners  last  wishes  and  last 
w^ords.  Those  almost  dying  thoughts  and  anxieties, 
let  it  be  remembered  to  her  immortal  honor,  were  not 
for  herself,  but  for  her  children  and  her  friends.  It 
was  dark  when  she  began  the  letter,  but  now  the  faint 
beams  of  sunrise  stole  through  the  narrow  window  of 
her  cell.  She  lay  down  on  her  straw  bed  and  tried  to 
sleep.  At  seven  the  executioner  came  in.  The  streets 
were  thronged  by  that  Parisian  mob,  whose  faces,  lurid 
with  crime  and  cruelty,  were  like  a  vision  of  pande- 
monium. She  was  used  to  their  looks  and  their  revil- 
ings,  and  minded  them  no  more.  It  is  a  merciful  dis- 
pensation that  the  extreme  of  sorrow  blunts  the 
keenness  of  it,  and  excess  of  pain  and  anguish  pro- 
duces an  awful  calm  and  apathy.  Otherwise  this 
world  of  ours  would  be  a  vast  madhouse,  with  only 
the  few  happy  ones  for  keepers.  Other  women,  and 
strong  men  also,  have  gone  stark,  raving  mad  at  one 
tenth  part  of  the  sufferings  this  sublime  woman 
endured.  Yet  the  wounds  were  deep,  and  had  left 
their  scars  in  the  white  hair,  and  the  wan,  furrowed 
face,  upon  which  still  those  lines  of  beauty  lingered 
which  had  evoked  the  praises  of  Europe  and  have 
been  described  with  the  eloquence  of  Lamartine.  A 
few  weeks  before  her  death  she  struck  her  head 
against  a  door  in  following  her  jaUer.  Being  asked  if 
she  was  hurt,  she  answered,  "  No,  nothing  can  hurt 
me  now."     An  English  lady  saw  her  in  her  dungeon, 


578        MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

for  any  one  who  asked  was  allowed  to  look  at  her,  on 
the  one  condition  of  expressing  no  sympathy,  and  said, 
in  a  letter  to  Lord  Auckland  :  ' '  She  was  sitting  on  an 
old  worn-out  chair  made  of  straw,  which  scarcely  suj)- 
I)orted  her  weight.  Dressed  in  a  gown  which  had 
once  been  white,  her  attitude  bespoke  the  immensity 
of  her  grief,  which  appeared  to  have  created  a  kind  of 
stupor,  that  fortunately  rendered  her  less  sensible  to  the 
injuries  and  reproaches  which  a  number  of  inhuman 
wretches  were  continually  vomiting  forth  against 
her.''  Well  might  Horace  ^Yalpole  write  in  this  very 
October,  1793  :  "  While  assemblies  calling  themselves 
men  are  from  day  to  day  meditating  torment  and  tort- 
ure for  his  (Louis  XVI. 's)  heroic  widow,  on  whom 
with  all  their  power  and  malice,  and  with  every  page, 
footman,  and  chambermaid  of  hers  in  their  reach,  and 
with  the  rack  in  theu-  hands,  they  have  not  been  able 
to  fix  a  speck.  Nay,  do  they  not  talk  of  the  inutility 
of  evidence  1  What  other  vktue  ever  sustained  such 
an  ordeal  V  In  a  common  cart,  seated  on  a  bare 
plank,  the  executioner  by  her  side  holding  the  cords 
with  which  her  hands  were  already  bound,  she  was 
borne  to  the  place  of  execution.  It  was  midday  when 
they  reached  the  scaffold.  Her  last  words  showed  the 
true  lady  and  the  queen.  In  descending  from  the  cart 
she  had  ste2:)ped  on  the  executioner's  foot.  "Excuse 
me,  sir,"  she  said,  "  I  did  not  do  it  on  purpose,"  and 
she  added,  "  Please  make  haste."  In  a  few  moments 
all  was  over. 

So  perished,  by  a  death  which  as  she  nobly  said  was 
to  her  not  ignominious  because  she  was  no  criminal, 
one  of  the  very  noblest  ^\ives  and  mothers.     She  had 


ONE   MORE   VICTIM.  579 

never  injured  or  borne  malice  against  a  single  human 
being.  Benevolence  was  native  to  her  soul,  and  her 
charities  were  only  bounded  by  her  means.  She  had 
those  virtues  of  purity,  fidelity,  courage,  and  affection 
which  exalt  humanity  and  redeem  our  fallen  race. 
She  was  an  angel. w^hom  accident  had  put  undeo.-  the 
power  of  devils.  If  families  are  reunited  in  a  brighter 
world  than  this,  there  is  no  reunion  that  heavenly 
spirits  would  more  gladly  gaze  upon  than  that  of 
these  poor  Capets,  King  and  Queen  of  France. 

One  more  victim  from  that  family  was  still  to  follow 
her.  The  saintly,  meek  and  self-sacrificing  aunt  steps 
out  upon  the  blood-red  canvas  and  completes  the  tab- 
leau. Madame  Elizabeth,  as  the  king's  sister  was 
called  since  titles  had  been  done  away,  with  a  courage 
and  contempt  of  life  worthy  of  her  faith  and  lineage, 
as  a  sincere  Roman  Catholic  Christian  as  well  as  a 
king's  daughter  and  a  king's  sister,  committed  the 
orphan  children  to  God's  holy  keeping,  and  went 
calmly  from  those  who,  in  the  words  of  Socrates, 
falsely  call  themselves  judges  upon  earth,  to  the  pres- 
ence of  the  eternal  justice.  Her  life  and  character  are 
a  study  worthy  of  a  volume  by  itself.  How  little  does 
the  world  appreciate  the  quiet  life-service  of  such  an 
aunt  and  sister  as  the  Princess  Elizabeth  had  proved 
herself  to  her  brother  Louis  and  his  wife  and  children. 
Young  and  beautiful,  she  had  chosen  to  share  their 
sorrows  when  she  might  have  wedded  nobly  or  passed 
a  brilliant  life  in  the  court  of  other  brothers,  two  of 
whom  were  in  turn  Emperors.  At  Vienna  the  Reign 
of  Terror  could  not  have  made  her  a  victim  and  a  mar- 
tyr, but  she  was  one  of  those  sweet  women  of  whom, 


580        MARIE   ANTOINETTE   AS   WIFE   AND   MOTHER. 

let  US  thank  God,  there  are  still  many  in  a  selfisli 
world,  who  have  no  thought  of  self,  who  forego  all 
thoughts  of  marrying  and  giving  in  marriage  to  tend  a 
brother's  or  a  sister's  little  ones,  and  who  resemble  in 
this  our  blessed  Saviour,  who  came  "not  to  be  min- 
istered to,  but  to  minister  and  to  give  His  life  a  ran- 
som for  many." 


THE  MOTHER  AND  WIFE  OF  ROBERT 

BURNS. 

Agnes  Brown,  the  wife  of  WUliam  Burness  or 
Burnes,  for  he  siDelled  his  name  both  ways,  was  an 
Ayrshire  lass  of  humble  birth,  who  is  described  as  a 
very  sagacious  woman,  sincerely  religious,  quick  in 
reading  character,  of  an  equable  temper,  and  with  a 
memory  stored  with  old  songs,  ballads,  and  Scottish 
traditions,  which  she  used  to  tell  or  sing  to  her  chil- 
dren. Of  these  children,  Robert  Burns,  the  greatest 
song-writer  that  Scotland,  or,  indeed,  any  other 
country  has  produced,  was  the  eldest.  It  was  in  a 
clay-built  cottage,  reared  by  his  father's  own  hands 
and  situated  about  two  miles  from  the  town  of  Ayr, 
that  this  extraordinary  genius  was  born,  on  the  25th 
of  January,  1759.  His  father  was  advanced  in  years 
when  he  married,  and  his  wife  was  many  years  younger 
than  himself.  In  his  personal  appearance  the  poet  re- 
sembled his  mother. 

The  youngest  daughter  of  Mrs.  Burns  gives  this  ac- 
count of  her  mother's  life,  which  may  be  found  in 
Chambers's  "  Life  of  Burns." 

"  She  was  only  nine  years  of  age  when  her  mother 
died,  leaving  four  younger  children.  When  the 
mother' s  death  was  looked  for,  a  sister  came  to  see  her, 
and  was  surprised  to  find  how  cheerful  she  was.  '  Are 
you  not  sorry  to  leave  your  husband  and  children  ? ' 


582         THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   ROBERT   BURNS. 

asked  the  sister.  '  No,'  was  the  answer.  '  I  leave  my 
chiklren  to  the  care  of  Gocl,  and  Gilbert  will  soon  get 
another  wife.'  "  The  father,  being  of  extra-frugal 
habits,  kept  all  his  servants  engaged  in  the  farm  and 
housework,  so  that  the  charge  of  the  children  fell  to 
the  care  of  the  eldest,  herself  a  mere  child,  but  no 
doubt  forced  into  a  premature  thoughtfulness  by  the 
extraordinary  circumstances. 

Agnes  had  been  taught  to  read  her  Bible  and  repeat 
the  Psalms  by  a  weaver  in  the  village,  who  kept  such 
young  pupils  beside  his  loom  as  he  sat  at  work.  At 
her  mother's  death,  this  kind  of  education  came  to  a 
stop,  and  it  was  never  resumed.  The  mother  of  Burns 
was  never  able  even  to  write  her  own  name.  Her  mind 
was  shrewd  and  intelligent,  but  unavoidably  warped 
with  j)rejudices,  though  not  to  a  serious  extent. 

After  her  father's  second  marriage,  Agnes  Brown 
was  sent  to  live  with  her  mother's  mother,  a  good, 
worthy  soul,  who  in  her  younger  days  had  sheltered 
the  persecuted  Covenanters.  When  this  old  person 
was  more  than  ordinarily  pleased  with  her  grand- 
daughter's doings  at  her  wheel,  she  gave  her  as  her 
ten  Jtours^  or  lunch,  a  piece  of  brown  bread  with  a 
piece  of  white  as  Jcitchen  to  it,  both  being  only 
varieties  of  oatmeal  cake.  While  here  Agnes  occa- 
sionally acted  as  guardsman  or  horse-driver  to  the 
ploughman,  William  Nelson,  and  assisted  him  to 
thrash  the  corn  with  the  flail.  They  became  attached, 
and  were  engaged  for  seven  years,  wiien,  at  the  mature 
age  of  twenty-six,  she  gave  him  up,  in  consequence  of 
a  moral  lapse  on  his  part,  of  the  kind  most  apt  to 
obliterate   the    affections  of    a  pure-minded  woman. 


PERSONAL   APPEARANCE.  583 

Soon  after  William  Burns  liai^pened  to  meet  her  at  a 
maypole  fair.  He  had  been  well  affected  to  a  girl  he 
used  to  meet  frequently  at  Alio  way  Mill,  and  he  had 
kept  a  letter  addressed  to  that  maiden  for  some  time 
locked  up  in  his  trunk.  He  was  now  so  much  pleased 
with  Agnes  that  immediately  on  returning  home  he 
took  the  epistle  from  his  trunk  and  burned  it.  After 
he  had  been  Agnes's  devoted  admirer  for  a  twelve- 
month, they  were  married,  and  little  more  than  another 
year  made  them  the  parents  of  the  most  remarkable 
man  of  Ms  age  in  Scotland. 

Mrs.  Burness  had  a  fine  complexion,  with  pale  red 
hair  and  beautiful  dark  eyes.  She  was  of  a  neat,  small 
figure,  extremely  active  and  industrious ;  naturallj'^ 
cheerful,  but  in  later  life  possessed  by  anxieties,  no 
doubt  a  consequence  of  the  life  of  hardships  and  diffi- 
culties through  which  it  had  been  her  lot  to  pass.  .  . 
The  low  deal  chair  on  which  Agnes  Brown  nursed  all 
her  offspring — a  very  interesting  relic  of  a  poet's 
mother — is  preserved  at  Closeburn  Hall,  Dumfries- 
shire, on  which  estate  she  lived  many  years. 

When  Robert  Burns  was  in  his  seventh  year  his 
parents  removed  to  Mount  Oliphant,  a  small  upland 
farm,  about  two  miles  from  the  Brig  o'  Doon.  He  had 
reached  his  eighteenth  year  when  the  lease  came  to  a 
close.  Tlie  soil  was  barren,  and  during  all  these  inter- 
vening years  the  Burns  family  suffered  great  priva- 
tions. They  toiled  hard,  but  could  not  "  draw  blood 
out  of  a  stone"  or  succeed  against  a  niggard  soil  and 
bad  seasons.  It  was  this  period  of  his  life  which 
Burns  described  as  combining  "  the  cheerless  gloom  of 
a  hermit  with  the  unceasing  moil  of  a  galley-slave.'" 


584        THE  MOTHER   AND  WIFE  OF  ROBERT   BURNS. 

In  Ms  autobiograpMcal  sketch  he  says  :  "  The  farm 
proved  a  ruinous  bargain.  I  was  the  eldest  of  seven 
children,  and  my  father,  worn  out  by  early  hardshixD, 
was  unfit  for  labor.  His  spirit  was  soon  irritated,  but 
not  easily  broken."  His  two  sons,  Robert  and  Gilbert, 
had  to  do  the  manual  labor  of  full-grown  men  while 
they  were  still  boys.  But  their  education  was  not 
neglected.  Their  parents  combined  with  four  other 
families  to  hire  a  young  teacher,  named  Murdock. 
From  his  descri^Dtion  we  gain  some  insight  into  the 
family  life.  Of  the  father,  Murdock  speaks  as  by  far 
the  best  man  he  ever  knew.  He  describes  him  as 
tender  and  affectionate  toward  his  children,  seeking 
not  to  drive,  but  to  lead  them  to  the  right  by  aj)pealing 
to  their  conscience  and  their  better  feelings  rather  than 
to  their  fears.  To  his  wife  he  was  gentle  and  consider- 
ate to  an  unusual  degree,  always  thinking  of  her  ease 
and  comfort ;  and  she  repaid  his  regard  with  the 
greatest  reverence  and  affection.  She  was  a  careful 
and  thrifty  housewife  ;  but  whenever  the  cares  of  her 
family  permitted  she  delighted  in  the  wise  and  prudent 
discourse  of  her  husband,  who  was  a  man  of  strong 
religious  principle  and  moral  convictions. 

In  1777  the  family  removed  to  Lochlea,  in  the  parish 
of  Tarbolton,  an  undulating  farm  on  the  north 
bank  of  the  Avr,  with  a  wide  outlook  southward  over 
the  hills  of  Carrick,  westward  toward  the  Isle  of 
Arran,  Ailsa  Craig,  and  down  the  Frith  of  Clyde 
toward  the  Western  Sea.  This  was  the  home  of 
Burns  and  his  family  from  his  eighteenth  till  his 
twenty-fifth  year.  For  a  time  the  family  life  here  was 
more  comfortable  than  it  had  been  at  Mount  Oliphant, 


DEATH   OF   HER   HUSBAXD.  585 

probably  because  several  of  the  children  were  now  able 
to  assist  their  parents  in  farm  labor.  It  was  during 
this  time  that  Robert,  now"  growing  into  manhood,  dis- 
regarded the  wishes  of  his  i)arents  by  attending  a 
dancing  school  in  the  neighboring  village.  Yet  his 
brother  Gilbert  testifies  that  his  conduct,  though  full 
of  love-making,  was  "  governed  by  the  strictest  rules 
of  virtue  and  modesty,  from  which  he  never  deviated 
till  he  reached  his  twenty-third  year." 

Burns's  father  died  in  February,  1784.  The  son 
reached  Lochlea  to  find  misfortunes  thickening  around 
his  family  and  his  father  on  his  death-bed.  The  old 
man  had  long  struggled  against  his  misfortunes  in 
agriculture,  and  now  consumption  had  set  in.  As  his 
last  moments  drew  near,  the  father  said  that  there  was 
one  of  his  children  of  whose  future  he  could  not  think 
without  fear.  Robert,  who  was  in  the  room,  came  -uj) 
to  his  bedside,  and  asked,  "  Oh,  father,  is  it  me  you 
mean  ?"  The  old  man  said  it  was.  Robert  turned  to 
the  window  and  hid  his  face,  down  which  the  tears  of 
remorse  and  grief  were  streaming.  His  father  had  • 
early  i)erceived  his  genius,  and  even  in  the  Mount 
Oliphant  days  had  said  to  his  wife,  "  Whoever  lives  to 
see  it,  something  extraordinary  will  come  from  that 
boy."  He  had  noted  also  with  apprehension  his 
headstrong  passions.  It  was  well  for  the  old  man  that 
he  was  laid  away  in  Allowav  churchyard  before  his 
forebodings  were  realized. 

To  the  mother  fell  as  hard  an  ordeal  as  any  through 
which  a  mother  can  well  be  called  upon  to  submit. 
Toward  the  close  of  1783  Robert  and  his  brother 
Gilbert  had  taken  on  their  own  account  a  lease  of  the 


580        THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   ROBERT   BURNS. 

small  farm  of  Mossgiel,  two  or  three  miles  distant  from 
Loclilea.  Thither  after  then*  father's  death  they  con- 
veyed their  widowed  mother  and  youngest  brothers 
and  sisters  in  March,  1784.  Burns  was  now  in  the  be- 
ginning of  his  twenty -sixth  year,  and  he  remained  at 
Mossgiel  four  years.  "  Three  things  those  years  and 
that  bare  moorland  farm  witnessed  —  the  wreck  of 
his  hopes  as  a  farmer,  the  revelation  of  his  genius  as  a 
poet,  and  the  frailty  of  his  character  as  a  man."  His 
immorality  sought  excuse  in  infidelity,  or  what  he 
deemed  '"  liberal  opinions."  He  gloried  in  his  shame, 
and  tried  to  stifle  the  upbraidings  of  his  conscience  for 
the  irreparable  wrong  he  had  done  a  woman.  His 
poor  old  mother  had  to  receive  the  child  that  was  the 
innocent  memento  of  her  son's  wrong-doing  and  its 
own  mother's  shame.  As  Lockhart  says:  "  His  false 
pride  recoiled  from  letting  his  jovial  associates  know 
how  little  he  was  able  to  drown  the  w^hispers  of  the 
still  small  voice,  and  the  fermenting  bitterness  of  a 
mind  ill  at  ease  within  himself,  escax)ed — as  may  be 
often  traced  in  the  history  of  satmsts — in  angry  sar- 
casms against  those  who,  whatever  their  private  sor- 
rows might  be,  had  at  least  done  him  no  wrong." 
Carlyle  remarks  upon  this  crisis  of  his  life:  "With 
principles  assailed  by  evil  example  from  without, 
by  passions  raging  like  demons  from  within,  he  had 
little  need  of  sceptical  misgivings  to  whisper  treason 
in  the  heat  of  the  battle,  or  to  cut  off  his  retreat  if  he 
were  already  defeated.  He  loses  his  feeling  of  inno- 
cence ;  his  mind  is  at  variance  with  itself  ;  the  old 
divinity  no  longer  presides  there  ;  but  wild  Desires  and 
wild  Repentance  alternately  oppress  him.     Erelong, 


A    SORROWFUL   TASK.  587 

too,  he  has  committed  himself  before  the  world ;  his 
character  for  sobriety,  dear  to  a  Scottish  peasant  as 
few  corrupted  worldlings  can  ever  conceive,  is  de- 
stroyed in  the  eyes  of  men,  and  his  only  refnge  con- 
sists in  trying  to  disbelieve  his  guiltiness,  and  'tis  but 
a  refuge  of  lies.  The  blackest  desperation  gathers 
over  him,  broken  only  by  the  red  lightnings  of  re- 
morse." 

The  care  of  his  illegitimate  child  must  have  been  a 
sorrowful  task  to  the  mother  of  Robert  Burns.  Xo 
doubt  she  performed  a  duty  she  might  have  excused 
herself  from  undertaking,  with  the  kindness  of  a 
woman  and  the  long-suffering  and  forgiveness  of  a 
Christian.  But  her  son' s  reckless  boasting  of  his  own 
misdeeds  and  defiance  of  moral  obligations  must  have 
filled  the  cuj)  of  her  humiliation  to  overflowing.  The 
ribald  verses  which  he  wrote,  satirizing  the  parish 
minister,  who  in  accordance  with  the  discipline  of  the 
Presbyterian  Kirk  required  him  to  do  jDublic  penance, 
must  have  grieved  to  the  soul  the  sincere  Christian 
mother,  whom  his  outrage  of  the  moral  law  had  dis- 
graced and  burdened.  We  need  not  think  the  less  of 
Burns' s  genius  because  truth  compels  us  to  reject  the 
flimsy  palliations  that  have  been  made  for  his  conduct. 
To  put  it  merely  upon  human  ground,  he  inflicted  upon 
a  poor  widowed  mother  and  her  household  a  shame  that 
very  few  mothers  would  have  tolerated  or  pardoned. 

Xo  reproaches  seemed  to  have  escaped  her,  and  no 
doubt  the  kindness  she  showed  him  by  caring  for  his 
child  at  this  critical  time  increased  the  affection  with 
which  he  seems  always  to  have  regarded  her.  After 
his  memorable  first  visit  to  Edinburgh,  where  he  was  re- 


588         THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   ROBERT   BURNS. 

ceived  on  equal  terms  in  the  best  circles  of  that  literary 
centre,  he  revisited  Mossgiel  on  the  8th  of  June,  1787. 
after  six  months'  absence.  His  mother  met  liim  witli 
the  simple  exclamation,  "  Oh,  Robert !"  In  that  brief 
welcome  she  conveyed  to  him  both  her  affection  and 
anxiety,  and  what  his  feelings  were  toward  her  may  be 
inferred  from  the  noble  sentiments  he  had  exj)ressed 
concerning  her  before  he  left  Edinburgh,  while  at  the 
height  of  his  fame  and  in  the  presence  of  the  aristoc- 
racy of  birth,  wealth,  and  learning.  It  reflects  credit 
on  his  manhood  that  amid  such  attractions  he  did  not 
forget  the  old  mother,  to  whom  in  his  early  years  he 
owed  so  much.  Something  also  he  tells  us  he  owed  to 
an  old  woman  who  resided  in  the  family  when  he  was 
a  child,  who  was  "  remarkable  for  her  ignorance, 
credulity,  and  superstition.  She  had,  I  supjDose,  the 
largest  collection  in  the  country  of  tales  and  songs 
concerning  devils,  ghosts,  fairies,  brownies,  witches, 
warlocks,  spunkies,  kelpies,  elf-candles,  dead  lights, 
wraiths,  aj)paritions,  cantrips,  giants,  enchanted 
towers,  dragons,  and  other  trumpery.  This  cultivated 
the  latent  seeds  of  poetry,  but  had  so  strong  an  effect 
upon  my  imagination  that  to  this  hour,  in  nocturnal 
rambles,  I  sometimes  keep  a  sharj)  lookout  in  sus- 
picious places  ;  and  though  nobody  can  be  more  scep- 
tical than  I  am  in  such  matters,  yet  it  takes  an  effort 
of  philosophy  to  shake  off  their  idle  terrors." 

The  quiet  family  and  humble  farm  he  now  revisited 
without  previous  notice  of  his  coming  might  well  be 
filled  wdth  pleasure.  When  he  had  left  them  he  was  in 
sore  poverty  and  disgrace  ;  he  was  now  an  acknowl- 
edged poet  of  his  native  land.     His  youngest  sister  told 


JEAN    ARMOUR.  589 

Mr.  Cliambers  that  "  her  brother  went  to  Glasgow, 
and  thence  sent  home  a  present  to  his  mother  and  three 
sisters — namely,  a  quantity  of  mode  silk,  enough  to 
make  a  bonnet  and  a  cloak  to  each,  and  a  gown  besides 
to  his  mother  and  youngest  sister."  It  is  pleasing  to 
mark  this  acknowledgment  on  his  part  of  their  natural 
right  to  participate  in  a  son  and  brother's  prosperity. 
Mrs.  Begg,  the  sister  referred  to,  remembered  going  for 
more  than  a  week  to  Ayr  to  assist  in  making  up  the 
dresses  ;  and  w^hen  she  came  back,  on  a  Saturday,  her 
brother  had  returned,  and  requested  her  to  put  on  her 
dress  that  he  might  "  see  how  smart  she  looked  in  it." 
It  was  during  this  visit  that  he  accidentally  met  Jean 
Armour,  his  wafe,  again,  and  they  renewed  their 
former  intimacy.  We  will  not  enter  upon  the  oft-told 
story  of  his  many  other  loves,  real  and  imaginary. 
They  had  not  dispelled  her  image  from  his  heart,  nor 
the  wrong  he  had  done  her  from  his  conscience.  In 
this  matter  his  conduct  admits  of  palliation,  for  it  was 
she  who  had  discarded  Burns,  at  the  command  of  her 
father.  Burns' s  subsequent  legal  marriage  with  her 
was  not  only  an  act  of  prudence,  but  of  honor.  Jean 
Armour  was  the  daughter  of  a  respectable  master 
mason  in  Mauchline,  the  neighboring  village  to 
Mossgiel.  All  through  the  year  1785  they  had  been 
intimate,  and  early  in  1786  a  secret  and  in-egular  mar- 
riage, with  a  written  acknowledgment  of  it,  had  to  be 
effected.  When  her  father  learned  this,  his  anger  was 
such  that  he  unwisely  compelled  Jean  not  only  to  give 
up  Bums,  but  to  destroy  that  document.  He  set  the 
law  in  motion  against  him,  and  the  poet  had  to  conceal 
himself  ;  and  out  of  the  twenty  pounds  he  received  for 


590        THE   MOTHER   AND  WIFE   OF   ROBERT   BURNS. 

liis  poems,  j)aid  nine  pounds  for  a  passage  to  the  West 
Indies,  to  become  a  slave-driver  to  a  Jamaica  jDlanter. 
The  fortunate  delays  of  the  vessel,  and  the  fame  his 
poems  began  to  secure  him  in  Edinburgh  and  through- 
out Scotland,  finally  dissuaded  him  from  his  purj)ose. 
This  was  in  the  spring  1786,  and  in  September  of  that 
year  Jean  Armour  became  the  mother  of  twin  children. 
In  a  letter  to  his  friend,  Robert  Aiken,  written  in 
the  following  month.  Burns  speaks  of  "the  conse- 
quences of  my  follies,  which  perhaps  make  it  im- 
practicable for  me  to  stay  at  home  ;  and  besides,  I  have 
for  some  time  been  pining  under  secret  wretchedness, 
from  causes  which  you  pretty  well  know — the  pang  of 
disappointment,  the  sting  of  i^ride,  with  some  wander- 
ing stabs  of  remorse,  which  never  fail  to  settle  on  my 
vitals  like  vultures,  when  attention  is  not  called  away 
by  the  calls  of  society  or  the  vagaries  of  the  muse. 
Even  in  the  hour  of  social  mirth  my  gayety  is  the 
madness  of  an  intoxicated  criminal  under  the  hands  of 
the  executioner.  All  these  reasons  urge  me  to  go 
abroad,  and  to  all  these  reasons  I  have  onlv  one  answer 
— the  feelings  of  a  father.  This,  in  the  present  mood  I 
am  in,  overbalances  everything  that  can  be  laid  in  the 
scale  against  it, 

"  You  may  perhajDS  think  it  an  extravagant  fancj-, 
but  it  is  a  sentiment  which  strikes  home  to  my  very 
soul ;  though  sceptical  in  some  points  of  our  current 
belief,  yet  I  think  I  have  every  evidence  for  the  reality 
of  a  life  beyond  the  stinted  bourn  of  our  present  ex- 
istence ;  if  so,  then,  how«  shoidd  I,  in  the  presence  of 
that  tremendous  Being,  the  author  of  existence — how 
should  I  meet  the  reproaches  of  those  who  stand  me  m 


MARRIED   TO   BURNS.  591 

the   relation   of    children,   whom  I    deserted   in    the 
smiling  innocency  of  helpless  infancy." 

During  his  second  visit  to  Edinburgh,  in  the  winter 
of  1788,  Burns  received  news  from  Mauchline  which 
greatly  agitated  him.  His  renewed  intercourse  with 
Jean  Armour  had  resulted  in  consequences  which  again 
aroused  her  father's  indignation  ;  this  time  he  turned 
his  daughter  out  of  doors.  Burns  provided  a  shelter 
for  her  under  the  roof  of  a  friend.  For  a  time  he 
seems  to  have  had  no  thought  of  further  reparation. 
But  in  March  he  received  an  appointment  on  the  Ex- 
cise, and  leased  a  farm  at  Ellisland.  In  April  he  left 
Edinburgh  and  returned  to  Ayrshire,  where  he  married 
Jean  Armour,  although  it  was  not  until  the  following 
August  that  the  pair  appeared  before  the  Kirk  Sessions 
and  were  formally  recognized  by  society  as  man  and 
A^T.fe.  "  Whether,  in  taking  this  stej).  Burns  thought 
that  he  was  carrying  out  a  legal  as  well  as  a  moral 
obligation,"  says  one  of  his  recent  biographers,  "we 
know  not.  The  interpreters  of  the  law  now  assert  that 
the  original  marriage  in  1786  had  never  been  dissolved, 
and  that  the  destruction  of  the  promissory  lines,  and 
the  temporary  disownment  of  him  by  Jean  and  her 
family,  could  not  in  any  way  invalidate  it.  Indeed, 
after  all  that  had  haiDpened,  for  Burns  to  have  deserted 
Jean,  and  married  another,  even  if  he  legally  could 
have  done  so,  would  have  been  the  basest  infidelity. 
Amid  all  his  other  errors  and  inconsistencies — and  no 
doubt  there  were  enough  of  these — we  cannot  but  be 
glad,  for  the  sake  of  his  good  name,  that  he  now  acted 
the  part  of  an  honest  maij,  and  did  what  he  could  to 
repair  the  much  suffering  and  shame  he  had  brought 


592         THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   ROBERT   BURNS. 

on  liis  frail  but  faithful  Jean."  And  Lockhart  justly 
remarks  that  "  had  he  hesitated  to  make  her  his  wife, 
whom  he  loved,  and  who  was  the  mother  of  his  chil- 
dren, he  must  have  sunk  into  the  callousness  of  a 
ruffian." 

Burns's  own  account  is  contained  in  two  of  his 
letters — the  one  to  Mrs.  Dunlop,  the  other  to  Miss 
Chalmers.  We  quote  them  because  they  give  us'  a 
vivid  picture  of  his  wife. 

To  the  former  he  writes  :  "  You  are  right  that  a 
bachelor  state  would  have  insured  me  more  friends  ; 
but  from  a  cause  you  will  easily  guess,  conscious  peace 
in  the  enjoyment  of  my  own  mind,  and  unmistrusting 
confidence  in  approaching  my  God,  would  seldom  have 
been  of  the  number.  I  found  a  once  much  loved  and 
still  much  loved,  female,  literally  and  truly  cast  out  to 
the  mercy  of  the  naked  elements  ;  but  I  enabled  her  to 
purchase  a  shelter  ;  there  is  no  sporting  with  a  fellow- 
creature's  happiness  or  misery.  The  most  placid  good- 
nature and  sweetness  of  disposition  ;  a  warm  heart, 
gratefully  devoted  with  all  its  j)owers  to  love  me  ;  vig- 
orous health  and  sprightly  cheerfulness,  set  off  to  the 
best  advantage  by  a  more  than  commonly  handsome 
figure — these,  I  think,  in  a  w^oman  may  make  a  good 
wife,  though  she  should  never  have  read  a  page  but  the 
Scriptures  of  the  Old  and  the  New  Testament,  nor 
have  danced  in  a  brighter  assembly  than  a  penny- j)ay 
wedding." 

To  Miss  Chalmers  he  says  : 

"  I  have  married  my  Jean.  I  had  a  long  and  much 
loved  fellow-creature's  happiness  or  misery  in  my 
determination,  and  I  durst  not  trifle  with  so  important 


A   PROUD   OLD    MOTHER.  593 

a  deposit,  nor  have  I  any  cause  to  repent  it.  If  I  have 
not  got  xDolite  tittle-tattle,  modish  manners,  and  fash- 
ionable dress,  I  am  not  sickened  and  disgusted  with 
the  multiform  curse  of  boarding-school  affectation  ; 
and  I  have  got  the  handsomest  figure,  the  sweetest 
temper,  the  soundest  constitution,  and  the  kindest 
heart  in  the  country.  ...  A  certain  late  publica- 
tion of  Scots  poems  she  has  perused  very  devotedly, 
and  all  the  ballads  of  the  country,  as  she  has  the  finest 
wood-note  wild  I  ever  heard.'' 

Cunningham,  one  of  Bums's  many  biographers,  says 
of  his  affection  for  Jean:  "He  loved  her;  he  never 
had  ceased  to  love  her  ;  he  considered  her  sacrifices  of 
him  as  made  to  the  pious  feelings  and  authority  of  her 
father. "  And  he  quotes  Burns' s  remark  on  the  same 
subject,  where  he  says  : 

"  I  can  have  no  nearer  idea  of  the  place  of  eternal 
punishment,  than  what  I  have  felt  in  my  own  bTeast 
on  her  account,  l^ever  man  loved,  or  rather  adored,  a 
woman  more  than  I  did  her,  and  I  do  still  love  her  to 
distraction  after  all." 

Burns' s  mother  and  sisters  rejoiced  in  his  fame,  and 
his  poems  were  sent  them  as  soon  as  printed.  The 
sisters  read  them  to  the  proud  old  mother,  who  never 
wearied  of  hearing  ' '  The  Cotter' s  Saturday  Night,  * ' 
"Halloween,"  and  other  favorite  pieces.  "The 
mother,"  it  was  said,  "had  no  drawback  to  her  ad- 
miration of  his  genius  but  the  fear  that  the  eclat  at- 
tending it  might  make  him  refiect  less  on  the  Giver  of 
all  good  gifts  than  was  his  duty." 

After  Burns' s  marriage  he  settled  down  to  farm  at 
Ellisland,  and  tried  in    poet   fashion  to  support    his 


594        THE   MOTHER  AND  WIFE   OF   ROBERT   BURNS. 

family  by  tilling  the  soil.     He  was  not  prosperous,  and 
though  his  Jean  was  a  faithful  wife  to  him  and  made 
their  little  go  far,  he  had  to  give  up  the  farm,  and,  to 
better  his  fortunes,  he  moved  to  Dumfries.    The  poet's 
health  failed  six  years  after  his  marriage,  and  his  last 
days  were  embittered  by  poverty  and  fear  of   want. 
He  superintended  the  education  of  his  children  with 
great  care,  and  to  his  eldest  son,  a  lad  of  great  promise, 
he  devoted  much  time,  directing  his  studies  and  stor- 
ing his  mind   with   knowledge.     The  Tvife  was  ever 
gentle  and  thoughtful  of  his  comfort,  making  all  things 
bend  to  his  moods,  and  trying  in  wifely  wa^ys  to  keep 
his  home  bright  and  restful  for  him.     It  was  said,  to 
the  credit  of  both,  that  no  reproachful  words  were  ever 
heard  between  them,  and  Burns' s  neighbors  often  saw, 
within  the  open  door  of  his  home,  the  family  circle 
gathered  about  him ;  he  reading  to  his  children,  Ms 
wife  moving  about  setting  matters  in  order,  and  occa- 
sionally stopping  to  hear  the  eager  questions  of  the 
children    and   her  husband's  replies  to  them.     Burns 
was  a  tender  father  and  affectionate  husband,  and  his 
faults  were  overlooked  by  his  w^ife,  who  never  ceased 
to   cherish  toward   him   the   love   given   him   in   her 
girlhood. 

Many  touching  stories  might  be  related  of  Mrs. 
Burns' s  thoughtful  consideration  and  appreciation  of 
her  gifted  but  rather  unmanageable  husband.  He 
was  variable  of  mood,  and  by  no  means  a  man  who 
could  be  dealt  with  as  ordinary  men  may.  The  wife 
knew  him  well,  and  when  in  one  of  his  compos- 
ing spells  she  wisely  left  liim  alone.  She  relates 
this  incident  of  one   of  his  poetical   obsessions  :    She 


DEATH  OF  BURNS.  595 

saw  Mm  walking  with  long  swinging  sort  of  strides, 
and  apparently  muttering  as  he  went,  and  left  him 
alone  for  some  time  ;  at  length  she  took  the  children 
with  her  and  went  forth  to  meet  him.  He  seemed 
not  to  observe  her,  but  continued  his  walk.  "  On 
this,"  said  she,  "I  stepped  aside  with  the  bairns 
among  the  broom — and  past  us  he  came,  his  brow 
flushed  and  his  eyes  shining  :  he  was  reciting  these 
lines  : 

'  Now  Tarn  !  O  Tam  !  had  thae  been  queans, 
A'  plumb  and  strapping  in  their  teens, 
Their  sarks,  instead  o'  creeshie  flannen. 
Been  snow-white  seventeen  hunder  linen  ! 
Thir  breeks  o'  mine,  my  only  pair, 
That  once  were  plush,  o'  gude  blue  hair, 
I  wad  hae  gi'en  them  off  my  hurdles, 
For  ae  blink  o'  the  bonnie  burdies  ! ' 

'^  I  wish  ye  had  but  seen  him  !  he  was  in  such  ecstasy 
that  the  tears  were  happing  down  his  cheeks.'' 

Wise  Jean,   that  she  did  not  disturb  his  trance  bv 
word  or  sign.     Surely  she  were  fit  to  be  wife  to  a  poet. 

On  the  14th  of  July  the  anxious  wife  received  a  let- 
ter from  her  husband,  who  was  at  the  sea-shore.  He 
calls  her  his  "  Dearest  Love,"  and  tells  her  that  the 
bathing  had  eased  his  pains,  but  had  done  nothing  to 
restore  his  health.  A  few  days  previously  he  had 
written  to  his  brother  that  he  was  dangerously  ill  and 
not  likely  to  get  better,  and  adding  :  "  God  keep  my 
wife  and  childi-en  !  If  I  am  taken  from  their  head 
they  will  be  poor  indeed.  Remember  me  to  my 
mother. "  This  was  Burns' s  last  message  to  his  mother. 
On  the  21st  he  died.     A  biographer  describes  the  inci- 


596         THE   MOTHER   AND   WIFE   OF   ROBERT   BURNS. 

dents  connected  with  his  last  days  as  follows  :  "  His 
household  iDresented  a  melancholy  sj)ectacle  :  the  poet 
dying  ;  his  wife  in  hourly  expectation  of  being  con- 
fined ;  four  helj)less  children  wandering  from  room  to 
room,  gazing  on  their  miserable  parents,  and  but  too 
little  food  or  cordial  kind  to  pacify  the  whole  or  soothe 
the  sick,"  Burns  died  at  the  age  of  thu-ty-seven  years 
and  seven  months,  and  his  wife  was  several  years 
younger.  She  lived  to  old  age,  and  died  in  the  house 
that  he  had  died  in.  She  was  placed  beyond  the  reach 
of  want  by  the  admirers  of  her  husband  shortly  after  his 
death,  and  was  thus  enabled  to  rear  her  children  in 
comfort.  Much  attention  was  paid  her  and  her  chil- 
dren, and  she,  knowing  that  it  was  for  her  husband's 
sake  so  much  kindness  was  shown,  deported  herself 
with  dignity  and  prudence,  and  was  an  honor  to  herself 
and  her  name. 


SHORT     SKETCHES     OF     SOME     WIVES    AND 

MOTHERS. 

LUCRETIA    MOTT. 

The  little  island  of  Nantucket,  lying  south-west  of 
Massachusetts,  is  to  be  honored  as  the  birthplace  of 
Lucretia  Coffin  Mott,  who  first  saw  the  light  on  the  3d 
of  January,  1793.     The  daughter  of  a  seafaring  man, 
Lucretia  was  one  of  many  girls  who  grew  up  in  that 
lonely    spot,     thoughtful,    practical,    independent    in 
opinion,  and  eminently  religious  in  nature.   Never  rich, 
the  family  were  reduced  to  unwonted  self-denial,  dur- 
ing her  girlhood,   by  her  father  losing  his  property 
through  indorsing  for  a  friend  who  afterward  failed  in 
business.     It  was^then  that  Lucretia's  mother  exhibit- 
ed that  remarkable  tact,  foresight,  and  energy  which 
women   so   frequently   develop   under  trials.      There 
were  eight  children  in  all,  and  Lucretia,  after  attending 
boarding-school  in  Dutchess  County,  New  York,  for  the 
space  of  two  years  without  visiting  home,  was  offered 
the  position  of  assistant  teacher  at  the  age  of  fifteen, 
which,  the  second  year,  was  changed  for  that  of  teach- 
er of  important  classes.     At  eighteen  years  of  age  Lu- 
cretia became  the  wife  of  James  Mott,  according  to  the 
silent  ceremony  of  a   Quaker  marriage — a  union   as 
beautiful  and  sacred  as  ever  tied  two  loyal  chastened 
spirits  in  one  solemnly  joyful  bond.     Personally  they 


598     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

were  sufficiently  unlike  to  supply  each  wliat  the  other 
needed.  He  was  cool,  quiet,  thoughtful  ;  she  glowing, 
enthusiastic,  intuitive.  She  recognized  the  fact  of  this 
difference,  and  her  love  of  humor  often  led  her  to  refer 
to  the  capacity  of  her  husband  for  silence.  Once 
when  James's  brother  Richard  was  visiting  at  their 
house,  she  was  startled  on  entering  the  drawing-room 
to  find  them  ensconced  on  either  side  the  fire.  "Oh," 
said  she,  "  I  ought  to  have  known  you  were  both  here, 
it  was  so  quiet." 

In  speaking  of  the  married  life  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Mott, 
Robert  Collyer  has  said  :  "If  James  and  Lucretia  had 
gone  around  the  world  in  search  of  a  mate,  I  think  they 
would  have  made  the  choice  which  Heaven  made  for 
them.  They  had  lived  together  more  than  forty  years 
when  I  first  knew  them.  I  thought  then,  as  I  think 
now,  that  it  was  the  most  perfect  wedded  life  to  be 
found  on  earth.  They  were  both  of  a  most  beautiful 
presence.  He  large,  fair,  with  kindly  blue  eyes  and 
regular  features.  She  slight,  w  itli  dark  eyes  and  hair. 
Both  of  the  sunniest  spirit,  both  free  to  take  their  own 
way,  as  such  fine  souls  always  are,  and  yet  their  lives 
were  so  perfectly  one  that  neither  of  them  led  or  follow- 
ed the  other,  so  far  as  one  could  observe,  by  the  breadth 
of  a  line.  He  could  speak  well,  in  a  slow,  wise  way, 
when  the  spirit  moved  him  ;  and  the  words  were  all  the 
choicer  because  they  were  so  few.  But  his  greatness — 
for  he  was  a  great  man — lay  still  in  that  fine,  silent 
manhood  which  would  only  break  into  fluent  speech 
as  you  sat  with  him  by  the  bright  wood  fire  in  winter, 
while  the  good  wife  went  on  with  her  knitting,  putting 
it  swiftly  down  a  score  of  times  in  an  hour  to  pound  a 


LUCRETIA   MOTT.  599 

vagrant  spark  which  had  snapped  on  the  carpet,  or  as 
we  sat  under  the  trees  in  the  summer  twilight." 

Her  friend  of  forty  years  and  her  best  biographer, 
Mrs.  Elizabeth  Cady  Stanton,  thus  characterizes  her : 

"Rarely  have  so  many  different  and  superior  qual- 
ities been  combined  in  one  woman.  She  had  great 
personal  beauty  ;  her  brow  and  eye  were  remarkable. 
Although  small  in  stature,  it  is  said  of  her  as  it  was 
of  Channing,  he  too  being  of  diminutive  size,  that  she 
made  you  think  she  was  larger  than  she  was.  She 
had  a  look  of  command.  The  amount  of  will  force 
and  intelligent  power  in  her  small  body  was  enough  to 
direct  the  universe.  Yet  she  was  modest  and  unassum- 
ing, and  had  none  of  the  personal  airs  of  leadership. 
Her  manners  were  gentle  and  self-possessed  under  all 
circunjstances.  Her  conversation,  though  generally 
serious,  earnest,  and  logical,  was  sometimes  playful 
and  always  good-humored.  Her  attitude  of  mind  was 
receptive.  She  never  seemed  to  think,  even  in  her 
latest  years,  that  she  had  explored  all  truth.  Though 
she  had  very  clearly  defined  opinions  on  every  subject 
that  came  under  her  consideration,  she  never  dogma- 
tized. It  was  this  healthy  balance  of  good  qualities 
that  made  her  great  among  other  women  of  genius, 
and  the  multiplicity  of  her  interests  in  human  af- 
fairs that  kept  her  fresh  and  young  to  the  last." 

Mrs.  Mott'  s  diary  is  more  interesting  than  any  other 
source  from  which  knowledge  of  her  life  may  be  gath- 
ered.    She  says : 

"I  always  loved  the  good  in  childhood,  and  desired 
to  do  the  right.  In  those  early  yeq^'S  I  was  actively 
useful  to  my  mother,  who,  in  the  abs(mce  of  my  father 


600     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

• 

on  Ms  long  voyages,  was  engaged  in  mercantile  busi- 
ness, often  going  to  Boston  to  purchase  goods  in  ex- 
change for  oil  and  candles,  the  staple  of  the  island. 
The  exercise  of  women's  talents  in  this  line,  as  well  as 
the  general  care  which  devolved  upon  them  in  the 
absence  of  their  husbands,  tended  to  develop  and 
strengthen  them  mentally  and  physically. 

"  In  1804  my  father's  family  removed  to  Boston,  and 
in  the  public  and  private  schools  of  that  city  I  mingled 
with  all  classes,  without  distinction.  It  was  the  custom 
then  to  send  the  children  of  such  families  to  select 
schools  ;  but  my  parents  feared  that  would  minister  to 
a  feeling  of  class  pride,  which  they  felt  was  sinful  to 
cultivate  in  their  children.  And  this  I  am  glad  to  re- 
member, because  it  gave  me  a  feeling  of  sympathy  for 
the  patient  and  struggling  poor,  which  but  for  this 
experience  I  might  never  have  known." 

Some  time  after  Lucretia'  s  marriage,  when  she  was 
the  mother  of  live  children,  reverses  came  to  her  hus- 
band, and  they  were  poor.  Equal  to  the  emergency, 
the  wife  and  mother  opened  a  school  and  helped  sup- 
port the  family  until  fortune  smiled  again.  Many  are 
the  anecdotes  on  record  of  her  care  and  thrift  as  well 
as  of  her  charity. 

Her  diary  continues  :  "At  twenty-five  years  of  age, 
surrounded  with  a  family  and  many  cares,  I  felt  called 
to  a  more  public  life  of  devotion  to  duty,  and  engaged 
in  the  ministry  in  the  Society  of  Friends,  receiving 
every  encouragement  from  those  in  authority  until 
the  separation  amongst  us  in  1827,  when  my  convic- 
tions led  me  to  ^adhere  to  those  who  believed  in  the 
sufficiency  of  the  light  within,  resting  on  '  truth  for 


LUCRETIA   MOTT.  601 

authority,  rather  than  authority  for  truth.'  The  pop- 
ular doctrine  of  original  sin  never  commended  itself 
to  my  reason  or  conscience,  except  on  the  theory  of 
original  holiness  also.  I  searched  the  Scriptures  daily, 
ofttimes  finding  a  construction  of  the  text  wholly  dif- 
ferent from  that  which  had  been  pressed  on  our  ac- 
ceptance. The  highest  evidence  of  a  sound  faith  being 
the  practical  life  of  the  Christian,  I  have  felt  a  far 
greater  interest  iij  the  moral  movements  of  the  age 
than  in  any  theological  discussion." 

Gerrit  Smith  describes  a  call  he  once  made  at  Mrs. 
Mott'  s  home  in  Philadelphia  in  these  words  :  ' '  In  a 
conversation  of  an  hour,  she  was  interrupted  half  a 
dozen  times  %\dth  applications  for  charity.  At  last  in 
came  the  glorious  Fanny  Kemble,  meeting  Mrs,  Mott 
in  a  manner  that  clearly  showed  they  were  warm  and 
well-known  friends  :  and  soon  came  Frederick  Douiz- 
lass." 

Her  house  was  always  the  resort  of  those  who  loved 
good  things  and  good  work.  The  foremost  people  in 
England  and  America  used  to  gather  around  the  family 
hearth  of  that  large  house  in  Arch  Street,  Philadel- 
phia, which  was  so  long  their  haj)py  home.  And  an 
ideal  home  it  was^ — the  abode  of  love,  intelligence,  and 
sympathy  with  everything  that  is  noble  and  beauti- 
ful. The  hostess  skilfully  led,  so  that  all  would  be 
interested  and  induced  to  talk,  and  she  herself  was 
the  most  delightful  and  sjonpathetic  of  listeners.  At 
the  hospitable  board  sat,  at  one  time  or  another,  many 
of  the  distinguished  people  of  the  age.  But  in  the 
midst  of  it  all,  Mrs.  Mott  never  lost  her  simple  house- 
hold  ways.      After  the   cheery  meal    was  over,  she 


C02     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

waslied  the  silver  and  cMiia  in  the  dining-room,  at  tlie 
same  time  joining  in  the  conversation,  which  was  al- 
ways striking,  animated,  and  informed  with  charity 
and  philanthropy. 

The  anti-slavery  sentiments  of  James  and  Lucretia 
Mott  were  never  concealed,  any  more  than  their  sym- 
pathy for  any  who  were  wronged  and  oppressed,  at  a 
time  when  reforms  were  most  unpopular.  Underneath 
it  all  was  a  spiritual  life,  earnest  and  glowing.  The  eyes 
of  this  heroine  lighted  up  with  a  holy  fervor  whenever 
she  arose  to  speak  "  of  the  things  of  the  Spirit,"  or  of 
human  rights  and  privileges.  At  such  times  she  was 
the  incarnation  of  eloquence.  She  seemed  filled  with 
the  very  flame  of  eloquence,  and  at  times  spoke  two 
hours  without  pause  on  "life  and  righteousness," 
while  the  crowd  stood  speechless  and  spell-bound, 
chained  by  the  magnetism  of  her  rare,  fine  presence. 
It  was  a  fervid  outpouring  of  masterful  eloquence, 
coming  from  a  soul  filled  with  highest  thoughts,  and 
warmed  with  the  tenderest  affection. 

To  woman  and  for  woman  Lucretia  Mott  was  at  the 
same  time  preacher,  teacher,  and  prophet.  She  be- 
lieved in  equal  opportunities  and  common  rights  ;  she 
voiced  the  injustice  of  laws  which  weighed  too  heavily 
on  a  large  jDortion  of  humanity.  The  cause  of  tem- 
perance, of  peace,  of  the  downfall  of  monopolies, 
always  found  in  her  an  advocate  who  convinced  the 
head  while  touching  the  heart.  "Truth  for  authority, 
not  authority  for  truth,"  was  the  motto  of  her  long 
and  blessed  life,  and  her  great  soul  lived  up  to  that 
noble  sentiment. 

In  her  daily  life  Mrs.  Mott  was  a  rigid  but  not  a 


LUCRETIA   MOTT.  603 

mean  economist.  What  she  saved  that  people  usually 
waste  was  spent  in  furthering  some  charity  dear  to 
that  great  heart  that  beat  responsive  to  every  struggle, 
to  every  woe.  And  through  it  all  was  an  influence, 
strongly  tending  to  such  good-will,  peace,  and  har- 
mony, that  even  the  bitterness  of  ignorance  and  bigot- 
ry were  overcome  by  the  sunshine  of  her  sweet  and 
saintly  presence. 

Mrs.  Mott' s  clear-headedness  was  not  at  all  obscured 
by  her  tender-heartedness,  and  no  one  could  ever  accuse 
her  of  prejudice  or  bigotry.  Of  a  frail  organization, 
she  looked  large  and  grand  when  inspired  by  some 
glowing  truth.  Her  faculties  were  so  evenly  balanced, 
her  good  sense  so  paramount,  that  she  moved  quietly 
along  her  appointed  grooves  of  life,  scattering  influences 
as  beneficent  as  those  of  the  cheerful  sunshine  to  the 
outer  world. 

A  few  years  before  her  demise,  James  Mott  fell 
asleep  to  this  world,  but  his  widow  was  cheered  by 
the  unfaltering  faith  of  meeting  him  in  a  better, 
where  there  are  no  partings.  But  she  lingered  not 
long.  On  November  11th,  1880,  Lucretia  Mott  yielded 
up  her  latest  breath  on  earth,  to  meet  the  glorified 
spirits  of  the  "Just  made  perfect." 

AVell  may  the  biographer  from  whom  we  have 
quoted  say  :  ' '  The  name  of  Lucretia  Mott  represents, 
more  fully  than  any  other  in  the  nineteenth  century, 
the  sum  of  all  womanly  virtues." 


604     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 
THE   MOTHER   OF   GAMBETTA. 

The  mother  of  Leon  Gambetta  was  one  of  the 
strongest  of  characters,  and  to  her  was  her  son  indebted 
not  only  for  the  nature  he  inherited,  but  the  advan- 
tages that  enabled  him  to  become  a  statesman.  He 
was  closely  attached  to  his  old  father,  but  by  race  and 
temperament  he  was  a  member  of  the  Massabie  family. 
His  mother,  Onasie  Massabie,  was  of  Jemsh  extraction, 
and  was  possessed  of  extraordinary  strength  of  char- 
acter. In  spealving  of  himself  on  one  occasion  to  a 
friend  he  remarked  :  ''  My  impetuosity  of  blood  I  have 
constantly  applied  myself  to  quell,  and  I  have  not  yet 
quite  succeeded.  It  was  my  mother's  gift ;  for  my 
temperament,  I  know,  I  owe  it  almost  entirely  to 
her." 

She  was  good-natured  and  sympathetic,  and  in  the 
village  of  Cahors,  where  she  lived,  she  was  a  great 
favorite.  Her  father  was  a  pharmaceutical  chemist, 
and  her  brother  was  educated  to  be  a  priest.  She  her- 
self was  a  thinker,  and  was  greatly  the  superior  in 
mental  attributes  of  her  husband.  She  had  a  head  for 
public  affairs,  and  but  for  her  husband's  opposition 
might  have  become  a  political  woman.  In  France,  of 
all  countries,  women  of  brains  have  opportunities  for 
enjoying  i)olitical  influence  and  wielding  power  in 
their  salons  not  shared  by  the  sex  in  other  countries. 
She  lived  in  a  dull  provincial  town,  and  her  husband 
was  a  small  hardware  dealer  and  grocer.  He  designed 
nothing  better  for  his  son  ;  but  his  wife,  while  she  be- 
longed, as  did  Madame  Roland,  to  the  petltes  bour- 
geoises^ was  intensely    ambitious  for  the   intellectual 


THE   MOTHER   OF   GAMBETTA.  605 

advancement  of  her  son.  Patiently,  bnt  with  a  brave 
spirit,  she  met  the  hard  facts  of  her  life  :  managed  her 
household  with  thrift,  worked  in  the  shop  with  her 
husband,  and  from  the  rising  to  the  setting  sun  had  no 
relief  from  toil.  Had  she  not  been  greater  than  the 
position  she  held,  the  world  would  not  have  heard  of 
Gambetta,  for  there  was  really  no  outward  encourage- 
ment for  her.  The  hope  and  strength  was  from  with- 
in, and  it  was  sufficient  to  bridge  the  chasm  of  poverty 
and  obscurity  and  enable  her  to  plant  her  feet  firmly 
on  the  higher  plane  she  saw  and  aspired  to  reach. 
Madame  Gambetta' s  influence  over  her  son  w^as  in 
proportion  to  her  gifts  of  intellect  and  her  disinter- 
ested love  for  him.  The  word  disinterested  is  used 
advisedly,  for  this  quality  of  love  is  not  common,  and 
even  between  mother  and  son  it  is  rarer  than  it  should 
be.  The  poor  mothers  of  strong  and  healthy  sons  look 
to  them  for  pecuniary  help,  or  at  least  they  expect 
them  to  care  for  themselves,  and  the  escape  from 
drudgery  and  poverty  is  almost  imj)ossible  for  a  son 
where  the  mother  is  a  burden  instead  of  an  inspiration. 
There  was  much  simplicity  in  Madame  Gambetta' s 
nature  ;  she  had  none  of  the  vulgar  pride  that  flaunts 
itself  in  the  faces  of  superiors.  She  tended  the  shop 
with  no  outward  sign  toward  her  betters  who  came  in 
to  buy  of  her.  She  could  not  enter  the  cii'cle  of  the 
upper  bourgeoisie  of  Cahors,  and  she  would  not  take 
her  friends  from  among  inferiors.  But  when  her  hus- 
band made  known  his  plans  for  their  son,  whom  she 
had  kept  at  school  through  her  persistency,  she  took 
the  ground  of  an  aristocrat,  and  declined  to  let  her  boy 
remain  on  her  level. 


606     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

He  should  go  to  other  and  better  schools  than  he  had 
attended  ;  he  was  now  sixteen  years  old,  and  had  out- 
grown all  the  lads  of  his  age  in  Cahors.  The  father 
objected,  and  compelled  him  to  go  into  his  shop  and 
begin  the  business  that  was  before  him.  The  mother 
said  nothing  until  her  plans  were  formed,  and  then  she 
showed  him  a  bag  of  money  which  she  had  saved — no- 
body knew  how  or  when — and  A\T.th  it  he  won  his 
freedom.  A  friend  of  Gambetta's  has  given  this  ac- 
count of  the  departure  of  the  youth  from  his  home  : 

"  One  day  his  mother  called  him  to  her  and  handed 
him  a  bag  of  money — enough  to  defray  the  cost  of  his 
journey  to  Paris  and  enable  him  to  study  law  there  for 
some  time.  A  trunk  full  of  clothing  had  been  pre- 
pared, and  was  at  the  office  of  the  stage-coach,  where  a 
place  was  booked  for  him  to  the  nearest  railway. 
Madame  Gambetta  instructed  him  to  slip  quieth* 
away,  in  order  to  avoid  a  painful  scene  with  his  father, 
who  was  determined  that  his  son  should  succeed  him  in 
the  business.  This  communication  was  so  unexpected 
and  delightful  that  for  the  rest  of  the  day  Leon  was  in 
a  state  of  bewilderment.  He  rose  betimes  next  morn- 
ing, and  stole  off  as  instructed." 

To  Paris  he  went  directly,  and  was  domiciled  in  a 
garret  until  his  father  pardoned  him  and  allowed  him 
an  income.  It  is  not  related  that  he  forgave  his  wife, 
but  doubtless  he  never  knew  the  extent  of  her  sinning 
in  the  matter.  He  certainly  did  not  know  this  inci- 
dent connected  with  her  son's  support  in  Paris,  which 
is  told  by  M.  Emile  Menier,  who  went  to  Cahors  in  1856, 
the  year  that  Gambetta  went  to  Paris.  He  was  a  choco- 
late manufacturer  at  Noisiel,  and  went  to  Cahors  on  a 


THE  MOTHER  OF  GAMBETTA.  607 

business  tour.  He  thus  tells  the  story  :  Calling  at 
the  "  Bazar  Genois"  he  was  received  by  Madame  Gani- 
betta.  In  answer  to  his  proposal  to  sell  his  goods  on 
commission,  she,  with  tears  in  her  eyes,  met  it  with 
another.  It  was  this.  "  I  have  a  son  of  great  promise, 
whom  I  want  to  send  to  Paris,  against  his  father's  will, 
to  study  law.  He  is  a  good  lad,  and  no  fool.  But  my 
husband,  who  wants  him  to  continue  his  business 
here,  will,  I  know,  try  to  starve  him  into  submission. 
What  I  am  about  to  proX)ose  is,  that  if  I  buy  your 
chocolate  at  the  rate  you  offer  it,  and  buy  it  outright, 
instead  of  taking  it  to  sell  on  commission,  you  will  say 
nothing  if  I  enter  it  at  a  higher  price,  and  you  will 
pay  the  difference  to  my  son."  M.  Menier  agreed, 
and  for  some  years  carried  out  the  arrangement. 
There  are  those  who  will  deem  such  an  act  impossible 
to  a  good  woman,  but  injustice  breeds  many  wrongs, 
and  M.  Gambetta,  and  not  his  wife,  is  to  be  held  ac- 
countable for  this  deceit.  She  worked  without  pay, 
doing  double  duty  in  her  home  and  in  the  shop,  and  in 
return  was  denied  the  privilege  of  using  her  earnings 
to  educate  their  child.  Indeed,  she  had  no  earnings, 
for  a  wife  is  practically  the  property  of  her  husband  in 
many  countries,  and  she  cannot  claim  wages  from  him. 
She  cannot  earn  money  outside,  and  if  she  wants  it,  is 
either  compelled  to  obtain  it  by  deceit  of  one  form  or 
another.  Madame  Gambetta  had  intelligence  beyond 
women  of  her  rank,  and  she  well  knew  that  what  was 
her  husband's  was  hers  for  any  lawful  or  right  pur- 
pose. The  lesson  of  her  persistency,  if  not  her  plan 
of  procedure,  should  be  admired.  A  mother's  in- 
tuitions told  her  that  her  son's  future  course  would 


G08     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS, 

justify  lier  in  overreaching  her  narrow-minded  hus- 
band, whom,  though  she  loved,  she  yet  knew  to  be  her 
inferior  in  worldly  wisdom  and  intellectual  force. 

Madame  Gambetta's  jjersonal   appearance    is    thus 
described  : 

Though  plain-mannered  and  unpretending,  she  was 
the  contrary  of  vulgar.  A  citizen  of  the  world  falling 
in  casually  with  her  in  her  latter  days  would  not  have 
supposed  that  her  school  education  was  of  the  most 
elementary  kind,  and  that  she  had  led  the  cramped 
life  of  a  small  provincial  tradeswoman.  It  was  from 
her  that  Gambetta  derived  those  faculties  which  have 
rendered  him  so  apt  to  personify  the  democratic  move- 
ment which  he  inaugurated  toward  the  close  of  the 
Second  Empire.  To  her,  also,  he  owes  that  taste  for 
the  eloquence  of  the  tribune  which  carried  him  so 
high.  This  remarkable  woman  and  admirable  mother 
designedly  stimulated  her  son's  oratorical  vocation  and 
turned  his  mental  energies  into  the  channel  in  which 
they  have  been  flowing. 

Madame  Gambetta  never  lost  her  influence  over  her 
son.  Even  after  he  became  President  of  the  French 
Republic,  she  exercised  it  with  prudence  and  care,  for 
she  knew  that  her  slightest  wish  was  a  law  to  Mm. 
Her  daugliter  revered  her  as  did  L6on,  but  her  career 
was  a  private  one,  and  there  was  no  need  for  decisive 
action  in  her  case  as  there  had  been  in  his. 

Her  sister  Mollie  Massabie  kept  house  for  Gambetta 
when  he  became  a  prominent  young  advocate  and 
afterward  a  successful  party  leader.  The  mother  re- 
sided in  Paris  occasionally  with  her  son,  but  never 
made  it  a  permanent  home.     His  public  career  was  re- 


CHIEF-JUSTICE   MARSHALL'S   WIFE.  609 

markable,  and  his  mother  was  an  eager  and  interested 
spectator  of  his  every  act.  He  deferred  to  her  when 
her  views  were  exjDressed,  for  his  warm  nature  was  the 
counterpart  of  hers,  and  her  mind  was,  if  untrained, 
as  strong  and  clear  as  his.  On  all  points  relating  to 
his  welfare,  immediately  or  remotely,  she  was  a 
judicious  monitor,  and  not  unfrequently  it  was  her 
voice  that  warned  him  against  those  who  attached 
themselves  to  him  when  fortune  smiled  upon  him. 

When  she  died,  in  July,  1882,  the  tidings  w^ere  im- 
parted to  him  as  he  sat  in  the  Chamber  listening  to  the 
speech  of  an  opponent.  .He  hastened  from  the  scene 
about  him  and  went  into  the  library,  where  his  sobs 
attested  the  grief  he  felt.  Madame  Gambetta's  death 
was  sudden,  and,  while  the  news  was  not  wholly  un- 
expected, for  she  had  been  failing  for  some  time,  her 
son  was  not  prepared  to  hear  that  his  best  earthly 
friend  had  gone. 

He  did  not  long  survive  her,  dying  in  January,  1883. 

CHIEF-JUSTICE   MAESHALL'S   WIFE. 

John"  Marshall,  of  Virginia,  Chief  Justice  of  the 
United  States,  was  a  man  the  simplicity  and  beauty 
of  whose  private  life  has  been  frequently  commented 
upon  in  print.  He  was  a  model  of  what  a  husband 
should  be  to  the  wife  of  his  bosom,  in  respect  to  the 
love  which  he  should  cherish  for  her,  the  tenderness 
with  which  he  should  watch  over  her  and  nurse  her  in 
failing  health,  and  the  fondness  ^vith  which  he  should 
think  of  her  when  death  has  taken  her  from  him. 

On  the  first  anniversary  of  his  wife's  death  he  wrote 
the  following  beautiful  tribute  to  her  memory  : 


610     SHOBT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

"December  25,  1832. 

"  This  day  of  joy  and  festivity  to  the  whole  Christian 
world  is  to  my  sad  heart  the  anniversary  of  the  keen- 
est affliction  which  humanity  can  sustain.  While  all 
around  is  gladness,  my  mind  dwells  on  the  silent  tomb, 
and  cherishes  the  remembrance  of  the  beloved  object  it 
contains. 

"  On  the  25th  of  December  it  was  the  will  of  Heaven 
to  take  to  itself  the  companion  who  had  sweetened  the 
choicest  part  of  my  life,  had  rendered  toil  a  pleasure, 
had  partaken  of*  all  my  feelings,  and  was  enthroned  in 
the  inmost  recess  of  my  heart. 

"  IS'ever  can  I  cease  to  feel  the  loss,  and  to  deplore 
it.  Grief  for  her  is  too  sacred  ever  to  be  profaned  on 
this  day,  which  shall  be  during  my  existence  devoted 
to  her  memory. 

"  On  the  3d  of  January,  1783,  I  was  united  by  the 
holiest  bonds  to  the  woman  I  adored.  From  the  hour 
of  our  union  to  that  of  our  separation  I  never  ceased 
to  thank  Heaven  for  this  its  best  gift.  Not  a  moment 
passed  in  which  I  did  not  consider  her  as  a  blessing 
from  which  the  chief  happiness  of  my  life  was  derived. 
This  never-dying  sentiment,  originating  in  love,  was 
cherished  by  a  long  and  close  observation  of  as  amiable 
and  estimable  qualities  as  ever  adorned  the  female 
bosom. 

"  To  a  person  which  in  youth  was  very  attractive,  to 
manners  uncommonly  pleasing,  she  added  a  fine  under- 
standing, and  the  sweetest  temper  which  can  accompany 
a  just  and  modest  sense  of  what  was  due  to  herself. 

"I saw  her  first  the  week  she  attained  the  age  of 
fourteen,  and  was  greatly  pleased  with  her. 


CHIEF-JUSTICE  MARSHALL'S   WIFE.  611 

"  Girls  tlien  came  into  company  mucli  earlier  tlian 
at  present.  As  my  attentions,  tliongli  mtliont  any 
avowed  XDurjjose,  nor  so  open  and  direct  as  to  alarm, 
soon  became  ardent  and  assiduous,  Iter  heart  received 
an  impression  which  could  never  be  effaced.  Having 
felt  no  prior  attachment,  she  became  at  sixteen  a  most 
devoted  wife.  All  my  faults — ^and  they  were  too  many 
— could  never  weaken  this  sentiment.  It  formed  a 
part  of  her  existence.  Her  judgment  was  so  sound  and 
so  safe  that  I  have  often  relied  upon  it  in  situations  of 
some  perplexity.  I  do  not  remember  ever  to  have 
regretted  the  adoption  of  her  opinion.  I  have  some- 
times regretted  its  rejection. 

"  From  native  timidity  she  was  opposed  to  every- 
thing adventurous,  yet  few  females  possessed  more  real 
firmness. 

"  That  timidity  so  influenced  her  manners  that  I 
could  rarely  prevail  on  her  to  display  in  company  the 
talents  I  knew  her  to  possess.  They  were  reserved  for 
her  husband  and  her  select  friends.  Though  serious 
as  well  as  gentle  in  her  deportment,  she  possessed  a 
good  deal  of  chaste,  delicate,  and  playful  wit,  and  if 
she  permitted  herself  to  indulge  this  talent,  told  her 
little  story  with  grace,  and  could  mimic  very  success- 
fully the  peculiarities  of  the  person  who  was  its  sub- 
ject. 

"  She  had  a  fine  taste  for  belles-lettres  readings, 
which  was  judiciouslj^  applied  in  the  selection  of 
pieces  she  admired. 

"  This  quality,  by  improving  her  talents  for  conver- 
sation, contributed  not  inconsiderably  to  make  her  a 
most  desirable  and  agreeable  companion.     It  beguiled 


612     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

many  of  those  winter  evenings  during  which  her  pro- 
tracted ill-health  and  her  feeble  nervous  system  con- 
fined us  entirely  to  each  other.  I  can  never  cease  to 
look  back  on  them  with  deep  interest  and  regret. 
Time  has  not  diminished,  and  will  not  diminish,  this 
interest  and  this  regret. 

"  In  all  the  relations  of  life  she  was  a  model  which 
those  to  whom  it  was  given  cannot  imitate  too  closely. 
As  the  wife,  the  mother,  the  mistress  of  a  family,  and 
the  friend,  her  life  furnished  an  example  to  those  who 
could  observe  intimately  which  will  not  be  forgotten. 
She  felt  deeply  the  distress  of  others,  and  indulged  the 
feeling  liberally  on  objects  she  believed  to  be  meri- 
torious. 

"  She  was  educated  with  a  profound  reverence  for 
religion,  which  she  preserved  to  her  last  moment. 
This  sentiment  among  her  earliest  and  deepest  impres- 
sions gave  character  to  her  whole  life.  Hers  was  the 
religion  taught  by  the  Saviour  of  man.  She  was  cheer- 
ful, mild,  benevolent,  serious,  humane,  intent  on  self- 
improvement  and  the  imj^rovement  of  those  who 
looked  to  her  for  precept  or  example.  She  was  a  firm 
believer  in  the  faith  inculcated  by  the  Church  in  which 
she  was  bred,  but  her  soft  and  gentle  temper  was 
incapable  of  adopting  the  gloomy  and  austere  dogmas 
which  some  of  its  professors  have  sought  to  engraft 
on  it. 

"  I  have  lost  her,  and  mth  her  I  have  lost  the  solace 
of  my  life.  Yet  she  remains  still  the  companion  of 
my  retired  hours,  still  occupies  my  inmost  bosom. 
When  alone  and  unemployed,  my  mind  unceasingly 
recurs  to  her. 


THE  MOTHER  OF  GEORGE   SAND.  613 

"  More  than  a  thousand  times  since  the  25th  of 
December,  1831,  have  I  repeated  to  myself  the  beauti- 
ful lines  written  by  Burgoyne  under  a  similar  affliction, 
substituting  Mary  for  Anna  : 

"  Encompassed  in  an  angel's  frame 
An  angel's  virtues  lay  : 
How  soon  did  Heaven  assert  its  claim, 
And  take  its  own  away  ! 

"  My  Mary's  worth,  my  Mary's  charms. 
Can  never  more  return. 
What  now  shall  fill  these  widowed  arms  ? 
Ah  me  !  my  Mary's  urn — 
Ah  me  !  ah  me  !  my  Mary's  urn." 

THE  MOTHER  OF  GEORGE  SAND. 

The  Mother  of  George  Sand  (Madame  Dude- 
vant)  was  remarkable  for  her  great  beauty  and  for  her 
passionate  devotion  to  those  whom  she  loved.  Ma- 
dame Dupin  was  the  daughter  of  a  bird-fancier  who 
trained  and  sold  birds  on  the  Quai  of  Paris  in  the 
middle  of  the  last  century.  His  young  daughter  was 
an  adept  at  the  art,  and  her  powers  if  not  her  expe- 
riences are  signalized  in  that  book  of  her  daughter 
called  "Tenerino,"  where  the  heroine  tames  wild  birds 
to  follow  her  and  eat  out  of  her  hand.  She  belonged, 
of  course,  to  the  bourgeoise  or  peasant  class  of  French 
society,  who  are  never  supposed  to  meet  socially  or  to 
marry  those  who  belong  to  the  so-called  noble  houses 
of  that  mercurial  nation. 

But  love  overleaps  all  such  artificial  barriers.  The 
young  Maurice  Dupin,  grandson  of  Marshal  Saxe, 
handsome,  young,  proud,  brave,  and  dazzling,  sees  the 
beautiful  girl  by  chance  in  the  streets  of  Paris,  and 


G14    SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

straightway  falls  in  love  with  her.     Nothing  could  be 
more  unlike  than  the  training  of  the  two  lovers. 

Young  Dupin  had  been,  since  the  death  of  his 
father,  under  the  care  of  a  mother  who  belonged  b}' 
pride  as  well  as  birth  to  that  old  regime  whose  family 
trees  are  of  more  import  than  are  the  destinies  of  dy- 
nasties and  nations.  A  scrupulous  observer  of  the 
proprieties,  proud  to  the  extent  of  haughtiness,  dis- 
dainful of  those  of  mean  origin,  she  was  cold  to  all 
the  world  save  to  her  dashing  only  son  and  child.  It  did 
not  occur  to  her  that  he  could  make  a  misalliance, 
and  it  was  a  sore  thing  for  the  aristocratic  old  lady 
when  the  pride  of  her  life  announced  to  her  that  he 
was  the  husband  of  the  gay,  beautiful,  but  untrained 
peasant  child-woman  who  was  soon  to  become  a 
mother. 

Young  Dupin,  an  officer  in  the  Imperial  service,  took 
his  wife  to  dwell  under  his  mother's  roof  while  he 
went  with  the  army.  And  nothing  could  present  a 
greater  contrast  than  these  two  women,  who  had  not 
one  single  point  of  sympathy  other  than  their  mutual 
love  for  him  who,  to  use  French  phraselogy,  "adored  " 
them  both. 

They  could  not  understand  one  another,  so  widely 
divergent  were  their  tastes,  habits,  and  views.  The 
old  lady's  religion  was  bound  up  in  those  convention- 
alities which  the  younger  lady  continually  shocked. 
Ignorant,  wild,  moody,  passionate,  she  gave  way  to 
violent  bursts  of  temper,  which  the  mother  of  the  hus- 
band only  increased  by  her  coolness  and  provoking 
disposition.  It  was  in  such  extremes  of  feeling  that 
the  little  Aurore  first  grew  into  consciousness,  and 


THE   MOTHER  OF   GEORGE   SAND.  615 

there  can  be  no  doubt  that  they  affected  her  life  and 
her  genius,  causing  many  of  those  unhappy  irregulari- 
ties which  she,  in  later  years,  fully  outgrew.  One 
cannot  suffer  such  violent  moral  and  mental  extremes 
with  impunity. 

As  was  natural,  the  mother  and  grandmother  fought 
for  possession  of  the  child.  While  yet  of  tender 
years,  Aurore'  s  father  was  killed  by  a  fall  from  his 
horse,  and  for  a  while  the  two  most  bereft  were  drawn 
nearer  together  by  the  greatest  of  all  seeming  calami- 
ties to  theii'  loving  hearts.  They  turned  to  their  only 
consolation,  the  little  girl,  who  was  a  striking  copy  of 
him  they  had  lost,  and  each  courted  and  petted, 
scolded  and  rebuked,  the  child,  over  whom  each  wished 
to  secure  influence. 

Nothing  could  be  more  unwholesome  than  their  con- 
tention over  this  girl  of  genius.  She  early  learned 
that  what  would  please  one  would  incense  the  other, 
and  her  days  passed  in  a  series  of  rebounds  from  in- 
dulgent frankness  and  liberty  to  excessive  and  injuri- 
ous repression.  And  one  cannot  wonder  at  her  after- 
extravagances,  in  regarding  her  hereditary  influences 
and  circumstances  of  that  period  in  which  j^outh  is 
so  impressible. 

The  mother  of  little  Aurore  never  learned  self- 
restraint  and  wisdom.  Her  nature,  like  the  surf  after 
a  storm,  beat  tremendously  upon  the  barriers  of  the 
shore  of  limitation  and  restraint  which  hedge  all  life, 
even  to  the  end.  She  still  lived  at  Nohaut  with  her 
child  and  her  mother-in-law,  rebellious,  untamed,  fiery 
as  ever.  Gradually  her  extreme  beauty  faded,  thougli 
she  was  always  noticeably  graceful  and  winning,  and 


616     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

it  was  with  a  feeling  of  relief  tliat  lier  friends  saw  this 
perfect  child  of  nature  sink  into  that  repose  of  death, 
where  all  the  angry  turbulence  of  a  vehement  nature 
is  forever  calmed.  The  career  of  Aurore,  who  wrote 
under  the  name  of  George  Sand,  was  to  the  very  end 
wonderfully  influenced  by  the  mingling  within  her 
being  of  these  two  kinds  of  blood,  whose  effervescence 
was  only  slowly  overcome. 

THE   MOTHER   OF    GEORGE   ELIOT. 

Mrs.  Evans,  the  mother  of  George  Eliot,  the  first 
among  women  novelists,  has  little  mention  in  the  his- 
tory of  her  daughter's  life.  She  died  when  that 
daughter  was  quite  young,  and  this  in  part  accounts 
for  the  circumstance.  Again,  she  and  her  daughter 
were  totally  unlike  in  disposition,  and  while  she  cared 
for  her  as  a  parent  she  did  not  thoroughly  appreciate 
her  as  a  woman.  She  was  a  good  person  and  a  notable 
housekeeper,  and  is  described  as  having  great  industry 
and  marked  qualities.  The  "  Mrs.  Hackif  of  Amos 
Barton  is  a  perfect  transcript  of  her  character,  and 
many  of  "Mrs.  Poyser's"  attributes  were  taken  from 
life.  She  was  matter-of-fact  and  epigrammatic  of 
speech,  and  had  little  of  the  literary  taste  which  her 
famous  daughter  exhibited  while  vet  a  small  child. 
Mrs.  Hackit  was  a  strongly  marked  figure,  with  a  sharp 
tongue,  a  chronic  liver  complaint,  and  of  quenchless 
energy.  Her  domestic  affairs  were  managed  in  clock- 
work fashion  ;  in  season  and  out  of  season  she  did 
what  was  planned  to  be  done,  and  the  laws  of  the  land 
were  not  half  so  rigidly  enforced  as  her  housekeeping. 
She  was  a  woman  who  did  not  change  her  plans  any 


THE   MOTHER  OF  GEORGE  ELIOT.  617 

more  than  she  did  the  fashions  of  her  dress,  and  was 
quick  of  temper  while  kind  of  heart. 

Mrs.  Evans  was  a  strict  member  of  the  Chnrch  of 
England,  as  was  her  husband,  and  their  daughter,  up 
to  her  seventeenth  or  eighteenth  year,  was  the  most 
trnly  pious  of  the  family.  She  says  of  herself  that  she 
was  earnestly  bent  upon  the  work  of  trying  "  to  shape 
this  anomalous  English  Christian  life  of  ours  into  some 
consistency  wdth  the  spirit  and  simple  verbal  tenor  of 
the  New  Testament." 

In  her  autobiographical  iDoem  entitled  "  Brother  and 
Sister"  she  alludes  to  her  mother  and  her  dearly  be- 
loved brother  Isaac.     It  begins  as  follows  : 

"  Our  mother  bade  us  keep  the  trodden  ways, 

Stroked  down  my  tippet,  set  my  brother's  frill, 
Then  with  the  benediction  of  her  gaze 

Chmg  to  us  lessening,  and  pursued  us  still. 
Across  the  homestead  to  the  rookery  elms, 

Whose  tall  old  trunks  had  each  a  grassy  mound, 
So  rich  for  us,  we  counted  them  as  realms 

With  varied  product.'" 

The  death  of  Mrs.  Evans  and  the  remarkable  course 
of  her  daughter  widely  severed  the  home  circle. 
Miss  Evans  changed  her  religious  views  entirely,  and 
greatly  pained  the  father  and  brother,  who  loved  her 
devotedly.  AVhen  Mr.  Evans  died  she  went  abroad, 
and  on  her  return  did  not  live  with  her  brother.  Her 
home  life  seems  to  have  been  wholly  wanting  in  like- 
ness to  the  average,  and  her  mother  was  so  little  essen- 
tial to  her  hapi)iness  that,  had  she  lived,  it  is  not  prob- 
able that  Marian  would  have  remained  at  home.  Her 
mind  was  bent  on  study,  and  she  had  little  taste  for  or 
interest  in  the  ordinary  avocations  of  women.     It  does 


618     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

not  appear  from  any  traditions  extant  that  Mrs.  Evans 
realized  her  daughter' s  intellectual  gifts,  but  with  her 
practical  views  she  would  hardly  have  put  the  estimate 
upon  them  that  the  world  did  afterward.  In  many  re- 
spects the  daughter  resembled  her  father,  but  none  of 
her  name  or  race  ever  possessed  a  tithe  of  her  genius. 
She  was  like  her  mother  in  one  respect,  however — she 
was  reticent  to  a  degree,  and  industriously  as  many 
have  gleaned  for  incidents  regarding  her  domestic  life, 
little  has  been  gathered.  She  was  a  woman  of  ideas, 
and  the  commonplace  had  no  part  or  parcel  in  her 
make-up  either  as  child,  maiden,  or  woman. 

Immaistuel  Kant,  the  philosopher,  was  a  great 
figure,  and  he  has  left  an  indelible  impress  upon  the 
history  of  human  thought.  As  professor,  philosopher, 
and  writer,  he  won  distinction,  and  his  "  Critique  of 
the  Pure  Reason"  ranked  him  with  the  leading  minds 
of  the  world. 

It  is  over  a  hundred  years  since  this  work  appeared, 
and  the  centenary  commemoration  was  celebrated  at 
Konigsberg  last  year  (1882).  Kant  was  born  in  Konigs- 
berg,  and  his  name  is  identified  with  it.  His  parents 
were  poor  tradespeople,  his  father  being  a  working  sad- 
dler, and  both  his  father  and  his  mother  were  enthusi- 
astically religious.  They  were  German  Protestants,  and 
were  members  of  a  society  of  Pietists  in  that  town. 
Kant  himself  has  given  us  a  touching  picture  of  the 
goodness  and  piety  of  his  parents,  whom  he  says, 
"  Never,  not  even  once,  in  his  knowledge,  did  they  say 
an  unbecoming  word  or  do  an  unworthv  act."  His 
mother,  he  tells  us,  "  was  a  lovely,  affectionate,  pious, 


THE   MOTHER   OF   IMMANUEL   KANT.  619 

and  upright  mother,  who  led  her  chiklren  to  the  fear 
of  God  by  means  of  pious  instruction  and  a  virtuous 
example."  There  were  eleven  children  in  the  saddler's 
home,  and  it  must  have  been  a  remarkable  mother  who 
could  have  devoted  the  time  and  had  the  knowledge  to 
impart,  which  she  gave  to  each.  She  often  took  her 
son  Immanuel  outside  the  city,  where  he  could  enjoy 
nature,  and  under  the  trees,  in  presence  of  the  birds 
and  flowers,  she  taught  him  of  the  Maker  of  them  all, 
and  of  the  divine  wisdom  displayed  in  all  nature. 
Unfortunately,  this  rare  mother  died  while  the  son 
who  was  to  make  her  famous  was  yet  a  lad.  Nine 
years  later  his  father  died,  -while  he  was  a  schoolboy. 
The  religious  character  of  his  parents  brought  him 
under  the  notice  of  their  pastor,  Br.  Schultz,  who  took 
a  great  interest  in  the  lad,  and  placed  him  in  the 
Gymnasium,  from  whence  he  went  to  the  University  of 
Konigsberg.  The  family  was  broken  up  after  the 
death  of  Mr.  Kant,  and  the  brothers  and  sisters  sei^a- 
rated,  to  be  together  no  more.  Kant,  who  seems  to 
have  been  the  only  member  of  it  who  had  the  educa- 
tional advantages  he  enjoyed,  saw  little  if  any  thing- 
more  of  his  kindred.  His  only  brother  became  a 
clergyman,  and  his  sisters,  who  were  in  an  inferior  posi- 
tion to  him,  were  almost  totally  ignored  by  him.  In 
his  old  age,  when  in  his  last  illness,  one  of  his  sisters, 
who  was  an  inmate  of  the  workhouse,  was  brought  to 
take  care  of  him,  and  when  she  entered  his  presence, 
she  did  not  know  him  or  he  her.  Kant  was  not  a  good 
son  of  a  good  mother,  or  he  would  not  have  neglected 
his  family  as  he  did.  He  had  little  respect  for  the 
sex,  lived  unmarried,  and  was  especially  hostile  tow- 


620     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

ard  cultured  women.  His  mother's  influence  over 
him  might  have  made  all  this  different,  but  few  men, 
either  learned  or  ignorant,  have  left  behind  them  so 
unlovely  a  record.  The  early  teachings  of  his  devout 
mother  were  entu'ely  obliterated  in  the  years  he  spent 
in  college. 

Elizabeth  Cromwell,  as  wife  and  mother,  deserves 
recognition.  She  filled  her  part  as  housewife,  when  no 
other  duties  were  required  of  her,  with  commendable 
credit,  and  when,  through  her  husband' s  accession  to 
power,  she  attained  a  dangerous  height,  she  played  her 
part  well.  She  was  not  'born  to  ex2:)ect  a  throne,  but 
she  M^as  of  a  resj^ectable  family,  and  had  that  degree 
of  gentility  which  enabled  her  to  deport  herself  well, 
and  to  protect  her  husband's  interests  by  womanly 
rectitude  and  reticence.  Her  nine  children  were  edu- 
cated with  great  care  under  her  supervision,  and  though 
the  Cavalier  party  invented  much  gossip  concerning 
her,  it  does  not  appear  that  she  ever  failed  to  x)erform 
her  public  as  well  as  her  private  duties  in  a  creditable 
manner. 

AVhen  Cromwell  was  first  confirmed  in  his  high  posi- 
tion, it  was  with  great  regret  that  his  wife  removed  from 
her  obscure  lodgings  to  Whitehall,  where  there  was 
much  pomp  and  grandeur.  Her  enemies,  or  rather  her 
husband's,  tauntingly  suggested  that  she  was  cleverer 
at  "  turning  the  spit"  than  steering  the  helm  of  state, 
but  it  does  not  appear  that  she  attempted  the  latter. 
That  she  could  have  done  both  was  to  her  honor. 

She  was  a  religious  enthusiast,  partaking  in  a  great 
measure  of  her  husband's  spirit  in  this  respect.     Her 


THE   DUCHESS   OF   MARLBOROUGH.  621 

mental  resources  were  not  great,  nor  does  she  appear  to 
have  possessed  any  personal  attractions.  She  was  a 
plain-looking  woman,  having  a  defect  in  one  of  her 
eyes.  Her  manner  was  dignified,  and  her  mode  of  life 
simple  and  unassuming.  She  had  much  influence  with 
her  husband,  and  in  several  of  his  letters  he  alludes  to 
circumstances  in  which  he  desires  to  be  advised  by  his 
wife,  and  in  one  of  his  letters  to  her  he  says  :  "I  could 
not  satisfy  myself  to  omit  this  post,  although  I  have 
not  much  to  wTite  ;  yet  indeed,  I  love  to  write  to  my 
dear,  who  is  very  much  in  my  heart."  Cromwell,  in 
his  letters  to  his  daughters — all  of  w^hom  were  women 
of  worth,  and  one  of  them,  Elizabeth,  was  a  person  of 
considerable  ability — invariably  speaks  with  tender- 
ness of  their  mother.  He  died  holding  his  wife' s  hand, 
and  almost  his  last  words  were  encouraging  assurances 
to  her  that  he  would  recover. 

Mrs.  Cromwell  survived  him  fourteen  years,  living  a 
quiet,  retired  life  in  the  house  of  her  son-in-law,  Mr. 
Claypole,  and  died  on  the  8th  of  October,  1672. 

The  Duchess  or  Marlborough  is  one  of  the  most 
picturesque  and  brilliant  of  all  the  heroines  of  his- 
tory. Her  husband  was  that  famous  Duke  whose 
courage  and  ability  brought  glory  upon  the  English 
army.  Sarah  Jennings  was  born  on  the  29th  of  May, 
1660,  at  Holywell,  near  St.  Alban's,  and  was  the 
daughter  of  a  gentleman  of  good  estate.  She  suc- 
ceeded her  eldest  sister,  the  Duchess  of  Tyrconnel, 
as  maid  of  honor  to  Princess  Anne,  who  afterward 
became  Queen  of  England  on  the  death  of  her  sister 
Mary  and  Prince  "William  of  Orange. 


622     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

Of  her  beauty,  wit,  political  power  and  ambition,  and 
of  lier  ascendency  over  Queen  Anne,  lier  contempora- 
ries never  cease  recounting.  The  friend  and  intimate  of 
Anne  while  yet  both  were  mere  playmates,  the  Prin- 
cess loved,  admired,  and  trusted  her  above  any  other 
friend.  Sarah  Jennings  early  had  the  choice  of  a  mul- 
titude of  lovers  :  she  selected  the  handsome,  dashing 
Duke,  who  was  hardly  her  equal  in  intellect,  but  much 
her  superior  in  amiability.  They  were  a  brave  couple, 
truly.  The  picture  extant  of  the  Duchess,  painted  by 
Sir  Godfrey  Kneller,  shows  one  of  the  most  brilliant 
and  noble-looking  of  women. 

The  influence  of  the  wilful  Duchess  completely 
dominated  the  indolent  and  silent  Anne,  and  to  a  great 
extent  her  own  husband.  She  was  faithful,  sincere, 
unselfish,  but  as  she  was  exposed  to  envy  and  jeal- 
ousy, grew  bitter,  defiant,  and  domineering.  The 
Duke  loved  her  most  tenderly,  and  she  seems  to  have 
not  only  returned  his  love,  but  to  have  been  worthy  of 
his  regard  and  confidence.  Her  grace,  majesty,  and 
loftiness  of  carriage  illuminated  the  dull  court,  while 
her  wit  flashed  like  an  unsheathed  sword  in  the  sun- 
light. Honors  crowded  thickly  ujion  them,  following 
the  Duke's  splendid  victories  of  Blenheim  and  Mal- 
plaquet ;  riches  were  showered  most  abundantly  upon 
their  heads.  Their  fine,  beautiful  daughters  all  mar- 
ried noblemen  of  high  rank,  yet  in  one  respect  the 
celebrated  Sarah  was  unfortunate.  An  estrangement 
occurred  between  her  and  the  Sovereign,  was  increased 
by  her  own  overbearing  disposition,  and  the  strange 
si)ectacle  was  exhibited  of  a  subject  withstanding  and 
coercing   Her   Majesty    the  Queen  of   Great    Britain. 


THE   MOTHER   OF   DANIEL   WEBSTER.  623 

No  doubt  it  embittered  the  last  days  of  both.  The 
Duchess  survived  her  Queen  and  her  own  hus- 
band, whom  she  tenderly  mourned  for  twenty -two 
years. 

The  mother  of  Daniel  Webster  united  the  powerful 
qualities  of  a  strong  intellect,  an  ardent  ambition,  and 
a  determined  spirit.  She  was  an  admirable  woman  in 
all  relations,  but  as  a  mother  she  was  remarkable. 
Her  son' s  earliest  lessons  were  taught  him  by  her. 
She  made  him  acquainted  with  the  Bible  so  soon  as 
he  could  read,  and  his  recollections  of  his  youth  always 
associated  her  and  Bible  verses.  She  recognized,  be- 
fore any  one  else  would  admit  the  fact,  that  her  son 
had  a  clear  and  vigorous  brain,  and  she  gave  up  less 
important  duties  to  instruct  him.  Daniel  Webster 
was  born  in  1782,  and  the  means  of  obtaining  an  edu- 
cation, even  in  Massachusetts,  at  that  time  were  diffi- 
cult. Schools  were  scarce  and  the  farmers  were  poor. 
Until  he  was  fourteen  years  old  he  was  directly  under 
the  control  and  instruction  of  his  mother,  and  was 
ready  to  take  his  place  in  school  at  the  head  of  stu- 
dents much  his  senior.  His  father  was  in  straitened 
circumstances  and  had  a  large  family  to  support,  but 
ways  and  means  were  found  for  placing  him  at  school, 
and  he  had  the  opportunity  his  mother  had  longed  to 
see  him  possess.  A  younger  brother  desired  to  be 
educated,  and  the  mother's  heart  was  as  anxious  for 
his  intellectual  development  as  she  had  been  for  her 
eldest  born.  The  father  felt  that  he  could  not  spare 
both  sons,  but  Mrs.  AVebster  thought  they  could,  and 
with   characteristic   quickness   saw   how  it  might   be 


624     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

accomplished.  The  matter  was  broached  to  the  hus- 
band and  father,  and  it  startled  him.  She  said  she 
had  lived  long  in  the  world,  and  been  happy  in  her 
children.  She  desired  above  all  things  to  see  them 
educated,  and  proposed  that  if  her  sons  would  promise 
to  look  after  their  parents'  comfort  in  old  age  she  would 
be  willing  to  sell  their  property  and  give  them  the  pro- 
ceeds. The  father  yielded,  and  the  farm  was  sold. 
Webster's  mother  could  never  have  accomplished  such 
a  thing  had  not  her  influence  over  her  husband  been 
powerful  and  her  own  courage  and  trust  been  extreme. 
Whatever  her  sons  were,  they  owed  it  to  their  mother, 
who  was  a  brave-hearted  New  England  woman,  a  noble 
representative  of  the  Puritan  stock  to  which  she  be- 
longed. 

SiSMONDi,  the  French  writer,  and  author  of  the 
"  History  of  the  Italian  Republics  of  the  Middle 
Ages,"  owed  his  literary  success  to  his  mother.  He 
inherited  his  intellectual  qualities  from  her,  and  was 
indebted  for  his  encouragement  in  his  earliest  efforts 
to  her.  At  one  time  he  was  on  the  point  of  aban- 
doning the  literary  career,  when  the  remonstrances  of 
his  mother  prevented  the  step.  She  wrote  him  these 
stirring  words  : 

"  Cheer  up,  my  child  !  Electrify  yourself  by  all 
possible  means — of  course,  all  that  are  honorable  and 
sure.  Dear  child,  I  exhort  you,  I  conjure  you,  do 
not  suffer  your  heart  to  be  oppressed  by  the  contrarie- 
ties you  encounter :  they  are  the  necessary  conse- 
quence of  the  trade  of  authorship ;  all  authors  begin 
with  them.  ...  I  will  not  suffer  you  to  speak  ill  of 


THE   MOTHER   OF   SCHILLER.  C25 

the  vocation  of  men  of  letters.  Come,  let  me  teach  you 
to  look  at  things  on  the  sunny  side,  and  if  you  learn 
this  from  me,  give  me  credit  for  it  before  the  world.  No 
doubt  the  man  of  letters  is  loaded  with  his  particular 
burden,  since  every  vocation  has  its  own  ;  but  ordinari- 
ly he  bears  a  smaller  part  of  the  common  burden  than 
others  ;  he  is  only  indirectly  affected  by  the  great 
shocks  of  life  :  trouble — that  is,  work— is  one  of  his 
l^leasures  ;  it^  reward  is  often  double  and  of  winning 
sweetness.  In  fact,  if  I  had  to  live  over  again  and  to 
choose,  I  would  adopt  the  literary  life  as  the  hap- 
piest." 

After  he  became  famous  she  deprecated  the  sceptical 
tone  of  his  writings,  and  wrote  him  a  warning  letter, 
urging  him  to  consider  the  harm  he  might  do  others, 
and  reminding  him  that  scepticism  made  no  one 
happy.  Another  time,  objecting  to  his  intimacy  with 
Madame  De  Stael,  she  says  :  "  If  I  could  find  the 
fairy  ring  which  pricked  the  finger  every  time  the 
wearer  was  about  to  commit  a  fault,  I  would  send  it  to 
you  as  an  additional  security." 

Of  the  mother  of  Schiller,  Johannes  Scherr  one  of 
his  biographers  says  :  "  Frau  Elisabeth  Dorothea  was, 
at  the  time  of  her  marriage,  a  slender  maiden  with 
blonde  hair,  inclining  to  red.  Without  beauty,  she  pos- 
sessed a  fine  forehead,  delicate,  attractive  features,  and 
expressive  eyes,  which  testified  to  the  kindness  of  heart 
that  distinguished  her  all  through  her  life,  and  lent  a 
great  charm  to  her  face.  By  nature  timid  and  retiring, 
she  bore  with  patience  the  trials  of  life,  and  fulfilled 
quietly  and  unostentatiously  the  duties  of  her  position. 


G2G     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

She  was  neither  a  sentimentalist,  nor  an  enthusiast, 
nor  a  musician,  nor  a  poetess,  as  we  have  been  told  by 
some  biographers  ;  but  her  religious  feeling  was  deep, 
and,  though  her  education  did  not  surpass  that  of  most 
burgher  maidens,  she  had  a  genuine  love  of  nature,  as 
well  as  for  the  beautiful  and  great  in  history.  In  her 
leisure  hours  she  delighted  in  the  poems  of  Gellert  and 
Uz,  and  was  also  very  fond  of  reading  history,  esj>e- 
cially  the  lives  of  great  men. "  * 

Dr.  Charles  I.  Hempel,  another  of  Schiller' s  biogra- 
l)hers,  says  :  "  Xo  observation  is  at  once  more  true  and 
more  hackneyed — that  it  is  to  the  easy  lessons  of  a 
mother  men  of  genius  have  usually  owed  their  earliest 
insjDiration.  Schiller's  mother  had  tastes  and  acquu^e- 
ments  rare  in  women  of  her  rank  ;  she  was  a  good  musi- 
cian, fond  of  poetry,  and  even  wrote  it ;  and  the  gen- 
tleness of  her  temper  gave  a  certain  refinement  to  her 
manners." 

Isaac  Watts  had  a  mother  who  was  possessed  of 
strong  characteristics,  and  who  Avas  singularly  self- 
possessed  and  dignified.  Her  husband  was  a  school- 
teacher, and  she  assisted  him  in  his  duties.  At  the 
time  Isaac  .was  born,  Mr.  Watts  was  in  prison  for 
attending  conventicles.  Mrs,  Watts,  anxious  to  make 
his  lot  as  endurable  as  possible,  would  go  on  sunny 
days  and  sit  under  the  window  of  his  cell  with  her 
little  child  in  her  arms,  where  he  could  see  her  and  the 
babe,  who  was  growing  so  finely.  Released  from  prison, 
the  father  had  to  exile  himself,  and  for  several  years  he 
was  separated  from  his  family.  At  last  King  James's 
indulgence  allowed  the  persecuted  Nonconformist  to 


CHRISTINA,  QUEEN  OF   SWEDEN.  627 

return  to  his  family,  and  the  wife  aided  her  husband 
in  keeping  a  boarding-school.  Mrs.  Watts  beguiled 
the  rainy  afternoons  by  offering  to  the  pupils  who 
boarded  in  the  house  a  prize  for,  the  best  poetical 
effusion.  She  was  a  helpful,  earnest  woman,  and  she 
was  above  all  else  a  prudent  one.  The  state  of  the 
times  in  which  she  lived  required  great  caution  on  the 
part  of  those  who  were  suspected  of  entertaining  antag- 
onistic religious  views,  and  she  jDroved  herself  to  be  a 
wise  woman  by  never  causing  herself  or  her  friends  the 
slightest  anxiety  on  this  account.  She  was  the  mother 
of  nine  children,  the  eldest  of  whom  subsequently 
enriched  Christian  literature  as  no  single  individual  has 
done  before  or  since  his  time. 

Christina,  Queen  of  Sweden,  daughter  of  the  great 
Gustavus  Adolphus,  was  the  famous  child  of  a  very 
ordinary  mother.  They  w^ere  utterly  unlike  in  charac- 
ter, the  mother  being  of  capricious  temper  and  weak  in 
judgment.  There  was  a  natural  antagonism  between 
the  two,  which  neither  knew  how  to  overcome.  Chris- 
tina held  her  mother' s  views  in  contempt,  and  displayed 
antipathy  toward  all  that  she  did  and  said.  She  was 
excessively  strong  in  will  power,  and  bold  and  deter- 
mined in  action,  while  her  mother,  who  was  Maria 
Eleonora  of  Brandenburg,  was  the  other  extreme,  being 
nervous,  irritable,  and  commonplace,  and,  like  all  com- 
moni)lace  people,  was  self-opinionated  and  hostile 
toward  those  who  manifested  originality  or  indepen- 
dence in  thought  or  action.  She  held  narrow  prejudices 
regarding  women,  and  her  daughter's  course  was  a 
harrowing  trial  to  her.     However,  her  daughter  was  a 


G28     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

queen,  and  it  was  impossible  for  her  to  dictate  to  her. 
Christina's  career  was  not  one  that  brought  her  honors 
and  reverence  in  her  last  years,  but  her  mother  was  not 
held  responsible  far  her  characteristics  or  her  conduct, 
for  from  the  time  she  was  two  years  old,  when  she  went 
on  a  journey  vdth  her  father  alone,  she  had  no  desire 
to  be  with  her  mother.  While  Gustavus  Adolphus 
lived,  she  was  his  constant  companion,  and  she  had 
not  at  any  time  in  her  life  any  intimates  or  even  asso- 
ciates among  women. 

Chateaubriand  attributes  the  restoration  of  his 
faith  in  religion  to  his  mother,  and  says,  in  the  preface 
to  his  "  Genius  of  Christianity,''  that  his  mother  on 
her  death-bed  charged  one  of  his  sisters  to  recall  him  to 
the  religion  in  which  he  had  been  brought  up.  He 
was  then  on  his  travels,  and  his  sister's  letter,  commu- 
nicating and  urging  upon  him  his  mother' s  last  wish, 
did  not  reach  him  until  the  sister  who  wrote  it  was 
herself  dead.  "  These  two  wishes,  rising  from  the 
tomb,  this  second  death  serving  as  an  interpreter  of 
the  first,  overwhelmed  me.  I  became  a  Christian.  I 
did  not  yield,  I  owti,  to  great  supernatural  lights.  My 
conviction  came  from  the  heart :  I  wept,  and  I  believed.' ' 
Elsewhere  he  writes  :  "  The  filial  tenderness  which  I 
retained  for  Madame  de  Chateaubriand  was  profound. 
My  infancy  and  my  youth  were  intimately  connected 
with  the  memory  of  my  mother.  All  that  I  knew 
came  from  her.  The  idea  of  having  j)oisoned  the  old 
age  of  the  woman  wlio  had  borne  me  in  her  bosom 
filled  me  with  despair.  I  flung  with  horror  into  the 
fire  the  '  Essay  on  Revolutions,'  as  the  instrument  of 


THE  MOTHEES   OF   GRAY   AND   DUMAS  629 

my  crime.  If  it  had  been  possible  for  me  to  annihilate 
the  work,  I  would  have  done  so  without  hesitation.  I 
did  not  recover  from  my  distress  till  the  thought  struck 
me  of  expiating  this  work  by  a  religious  work,  Sucli 
was  the  origin  of  the  '  Genius  of  Christianity.'  " 

The  poet  Gray  seldom  mentioned  his  mother  with- 
out a  sigh.  In  a  letter  he  wrote  to  a  friend  he  says  : 
"  I  have  discovered  a  thing  very  little  known,  which  is, " 
that  in  one' s  whole  life  one  can  never  have  any  more 
than  a  single  mother.  You  may  think  this  is  obvious, 
and  (what  you  call)  a  trite  observation.  You  are  a  green 
gosling  !  I  was  at  the  same  age  (very  near)  as  wise  as 
you,  and  yet  I  never  discovered  this  (with  full  evidence 
and  conviction,  I  mean)  till  it  was  too  late.  It  is  thir- 
teen years  ago,  and  seems  but  as  yesterday,  and  every 
day  I  live  it  sinks  deeper  into  my  heart." 

He  owed  everything  to  his  mother.  She  saved  his 
life,  when  in  infancy  he  was  suffocating  from  fulness 
of  blood,  by  opening  a  vein  which  removed  the  parox- 
ysm. Eleven  of  her  children  had  died  in  this  way,  and 
her  last  son  would  have  followed  them  but  for  her  pres- 
ence of  mind  and  independent  course.  And  when  her 
boy  was  ready  to  go  to  Eton  and  Cambridge,  she  earned 
the  money  that  was  required,  by  her  own  industry.  His 
father  was  a  poor  tradesman  who  either  could  not  or 
would  not  supply  him  with  the  means  to  obtain  an  ed- 
ucation. 

Dumas' s  mother,  the  wife  and  widow  of  General 
Dumas,  was  the  daughter  of  the  chief  innkeeper  of 
Villers  Coterets,  a  little  town  about  sixty  miles  north- 


630     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

east  of  Paris.  Slie  was  allied  to  the  gentry  of  the 
country  as  well  as  the  bourgeois  of  the  town.  Persons 
of  these  different  classes  met  at  the  same  fete  and 
joined  in  the  same  dance,  and  this  without  derogating 
from  their  rank  or  presuming  uj)on  the  familiarity  so 
as  to  cause  an  inconvenient  result.  Villers  Coterets 
was  the  country  residence  of  the  House  of  Orleans,  and 
was  to  it  what  Versailles  was  to  the  king. 

Dumas'  s  Memoirs  contain  charming  pictures  of  vil- 
lage fetes  and  rustic  festivities,  sporting  stories  and  de- 
scriptions of  boar-hunts.  His  father's  half  pay  dying 
with  him,  his  mother  and  himself  had  nothing  left 
but  an  insignificant  sum,  too  small  put  out  at  interest 
to  produce  an  income.  Still  they  managed  to  live, 
and  he  even  procured  some  education  through  her  ex- 
ertions, before  entering  upon  an  apprenticeship  as  a 
notary's  clerk. 

The  great  Buffon,  who,  according  to  Th.  Ribot, 
"  held  the  doctrine  of  cross-heredity,  used  to  say  that 
he  himself  took  after  his  mother. "  He  believed  that 
children  usually  inherit  intellectual  and  moral  qualities 
from  their  mother.  In  his  own  case,  he  claimed  that 
this  was  true.  His  mother  was  a  woman  of  much 
ability,  and  of  great  intellectual  superiority.  Buffon 
always  spoke  of  her  in  terms  of  highest  praise  and 
admiration. 

Alexander  Pope,  who  inherited  from  his  father  his 
physical  deformity,  alludes  tenderly  to  his  mother  in 
the  "  Prologue  to  the  Satires  :" 


THE  MOTHERS  OF  CURRAX  AND  FENELON.     631 

"  Me  let  the  leader  office  long  engage 
To  rock  the  cradle  of  reposing  age  ; 
With  lenient  arts  extend  a  mother's  breath, 
Make  languor  smile,  and  smooth  the  bed  of  death  ; 
Explore  the  thought,  explain  the  asking  eye, 
And  keep  awhile  one  parent  from  the  sky." 

CuerajST,  the  great  Irish  actor  and  wit,  pays  a  high 
tribute  to  his  mother  :  "  The  only  inheritance  I  could 
boast  of  from  my  poor  father  was  the  very  scanty  one 
of  a  face  and  figure  like  his  own  ;  and  if  the  world  has 
ever  attributed  to  me  something  more  valuable  than 
face  or  person,  or  than  earthly  wealth,  it  was  that 
another  and  dearer  parent  gave  her  child  a  fortune 
from  the  treasures  of  her  mind." 

LoFiSE  DE  Saint  Arbre,  the  mother  of  Fenelon,  was 
the  daughter  of  a  noble  house,  and  was  endowed  by 
nature  with  beauty  and  grace,  and  with  a  keen,  dis- 
criminating judgment.  She  conducted  the  education 
of  her  son  under  the  paternal  roof  until  he  was  twelve 
years  old,  having  as  assistant  a  domestic  preceptor  in 
the  study  of  sacred  literature  and  the  Greek  and  Latin 
classics. 

The  vdves  of  men  of  genius  are  not  always  women  of 
sentiment.  When  Sir  Walter  Scott  said  to  his  wife,  as 
they  were  rambling  about  their  estate,  "  Ah,  'tis  no 
wonder  that  poets  from  the  earliest  ages  have  made  the 
lamb  the  emblem  of  peace  and  innocence,"  the  stupid 
Lady  Scott  replied,  "  They  are  indeed  delightful 
animals,  especially  with  mint  sauce." 


632     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

Cowley's  mother  was  a  widow  in  straitened  cir- 
cumstances, who  was  able,  but  not  without  great  diffi- 
culty, to  secure  him  a  literary  education.  She  lived 
to  rejoice  that  she  had  made  the  sacrifices  she  did  for 
the  sake  of  her  poet  son.  He  was  an  appreciative  and 
eminent  son. 

The  mother  of  Thomas  a  Becket  may  rightly  be 
classed  with  obscure  mothers.  Nothing  is  known  of 
her,  says  Mr.  Froude,  excejDt  that  she  was  a  religious 
woman,  who  brought  up  her  children  in  the  fear  of 
God.     She  died  when  he  was  very  young. 

The  poets  Campbell  and  Crabbe  have  left  on  record 
the  debt  they  owed  their  mothers.  Campbell's 
mother  had  the  strong  taste  for  music  which  the  poet 
inherited,  and  from  her  he  learned  the  ballad  poetry 
of  Scotland  which  he  never  lost. 

Thomson,  the  poet,  was  another  man  of  letters 
who  owed  his  education  to  the  toils  of  his  widowed 
mother.  She  earned  the  money  that  enabled  him  to 
live  in  Edinburgh  and  pursue  his  studies. 

We  cannot  doubt  that  many  of  the  strong,  self-con- 
tained characteristics  of  General  Ulysses  Simpson 
Grant,  late  President"  of  the  United  States,  were  derived 
from  his  mother.  This  excellent  woman,  who  had  faith- 
fully and  lovingly  fulfilled  her  duties  in  those  quiet 
walks  of  life  where  the  groundwork  of  the  elements  of 
manhood  were  laid  in  honor  and  integrity,  was  born  in 
Pennsylvania,  a  few  miles  from  Philadelphia,  early  in 


THE  MOTHER  OF  GENERAL  GRANT.        633 

the  century,  and  became  tlie  wife  of  Jesse  Root  Grant 
on  June  24th,  1821,  at  Point  Pleasant,  Ohio.  On  the 
29th  of  the  next  April  Mrs.  Grant  became  the  mother 
of  Ulysses  Simi)son,  whose  name  is  coextensive  with 
that  of  the  War  of  the  Rebellion  and  with  the  Ameri- 
can  Union.  Mrs.  Hannah  S.  Grant,  a  sweet,  kind, 
matronly  woman,  who  had  found  her  enjoyment  in  the 
domestic  circle,  survived  her  husband  several  years. 
He  used  to  declare  that  his  wife,  though  a  simple 
country  girl,  was  "  handsome,  but  not  vain."  She 
must  have  had  opportanities  above  the  average  country 
gui,  since  she  was  the  sole  daughter  of  a  thrifty 
farmer,  w^ho  removed  from  Pennsylvania  to  Ohio  two 
years  before  theh'  marriage.  Common  report  declares 
her  to  have  been  possessed  of  a  sweet  disposition, 
prudent,  thoughtful,  and  pious,  and  accomplished  in 
those  household  arts  which  add  so  much  to  the  com- 
fort of  a  home. 

One  of  Gen.  Grant's  biograj^hers — and  no  man  has 
had  more  than  he — describes  Mrs.  Grant  as  follows, 
and  gives  her  the  credit  of  having  bequeathed  to  her 
son  many  of  his  best  traits  : 

"  She  was  amiable,  serene,  even-tempered,  thor- 
oughly  self-forgetful,  kind  and  considerate  to  all,  and 
speaking  ill  of  none.  Her  children  she  governed  with 
tender  affection  and  without  the  rod  ;  and  in  return 
they  were  tractable  and  well-behaved,  never  boisterous 
nor  rude  in  the  family  circle.  She  was  exceedingly 
reticent  and  exceedingly  modest.  Whatever  she 
thought  of  her  boys  and  girls  in  her  mother-heart, 
she  never  praised  them  before  others.  Though  feeling 
high  and  just  piide  in  her  illustrious  son,  and  fond  of 


034     SHORT  SKETCHES  OF  SOME  WIVES  AND  MOTHERS. 

reading  all  that  was  said  of  him,  she  not  only  refrained 
from  boasting  of  him,  but  sometunes  blushed  like  a 
giii  and  left  the  room  when  his  praises  were  sounded 
in  her  ears  ;  for  it  seemed  akin  to  hearing  self-praise, 
which  she  regarded  with  unmitigated  horror.  In  her 
old  age  she  had  calm,  winning  manners,  and  a  face  still 
sweet  and  still  young  in  the  nicest  sense  of  Holmes  : 

"  For  him  in  vain  the  envious  seasons  roll, 
Who  bears  eternal  summer  in  his  soul." 

Mrs.  Grant,  though  the  mother  of  the  most  success- 
ful general  of  the  age,  and  who  was  twice  elected 
President  of  the  United  States,  was  never  to  the  least 
extent  before  the  public  in  the  social  way  that  is  true 
of  so  many  mothers  of  great  men.  The  reflection  of 
his  fame  rested  upon  her,  but  she  lived  her  old  age 
in  perfect  seclusion,  away  from  the  world  and  apart 
from  its  vanities  and  pleasures,  its.  work  and  its  duties. 
She  was  an  elderly  woman  when  he  came  before  the 
people  of  his  country  as  one  of  the  leading  officers  of 
the  Union  armv  in  the  Civil  War,  and  chose  to  remain 
in  her  retirement.  Her  home  was  broken  up  by  the 
death  of  her  husband,  and  in  her  old  age  she  was  an 
honored  member  of  her  daughter's  home  in  Wew 
Jersey. 


ABIGAIL  ADAMS. 

In  very  many  respects  Abigail  Adams,  the  wife  of 
Jolm  Adams,  the  second  President  of  the  United 
States,  mother  of  the  sixth,  and  "  Portia  of  the  rebel- 
lious provinces,"  is  the  greatest  of  American  women. 
She  had  a  great  husband,  one  who  encouraged  her  to 
be  the  thinker,  reasoner,  and  fearless  patriot  that  she 
was.  He  on  one  occasion  wrote  her,  regarding  a  cer- 
tain statesman,  words  which  were  as  true  in  his  case  as 
in  that  of  the  person  of  whom  he  w^as  speaking.  He 
said  :  "In  reading  history  you  will  generally  observe, 
.  when  you  find  a  great  character,  whether  a  general,  a 
statesman,  or  a  philosopher,  some  female  about  him, 
either  in  the  character  of  a  mother,  wife,  or  sister,  who 
had  knowledge  and  ambition  above  the  ordinary  level 
of  women,  and  that  mach  of  his  eminence  is  owing  to 
her  precepts,  examj^le,  or  investigation,  in  some  shape 
or  other." 

Mrs.  Adams  was  a  woman  who  in  the  strife  of  war, 
separated  for  months  and  years  at  a  time  from  her 
husband,  remained  upon  their  little  farm  at  Wey- 
mouth, Mass.,  and  so  wisely  and  judiciously  managed 
that  at  the  end  of  his  public  life  they  had  a  small  com- 
petence to  live  upon  and  a  home  to  shelter  them  in 
their  last  days. 

She  had  a  wonderful  understanding,  the  inheritance 
bequeathed  her  by  ancestors,  who  on  both  sides  were 


€36  ABIGAIL   ADAMS. 

ministers.  She  was  the  daughter,  granddaughter,  and 
great-granddaughter  of  a  minister,  and  was  herseK  a 
teacher  and  preacher,  though  her  abilities  were  not  ex- 
ercised beyond  the  limits  of  home.  Sidney  Smith  said 
that  if  quadratics  affected  a  woman's  womanliness,  it 
was  because  she  was  poor  stuff  to  begin  with.  The 
women  of  the  Revolution  affected  much  more  than 
quadratics,  and  they  remained  the  finest  specimens  of 
the  sex.  It  is  with  a  curious  mixture  of  awe  and 
amusement  that  one  reads  the  letters  of  the  letter- writ- 
ing women  of  this  countiy  during  the  closing  years  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  Some  of  them  are  statesman- 
like, despite  their  stilted  and  formal  style. 

Mrs.  Adams  stands  at  the  head  of  her  countrywomen 
in  this  respect.  She  was  the  finest  correspondent  a 
man  could  have,  because  while  she  was  observing  and 
discriminating  in  giving  facts,  she  was  full  of  sugges- 
tions, and  her  delicacy  in  treating  social  matters  was 
remarkable.  A  hundred  years  hence  they  will  be  read 
with  equal  interest  as  now.  She  never  had  a  day's 
schooling,  and  in  referring  to  this  fact  she  says  : 

"  My  early  education  did  not  partake  of  the  abun- 
dant opxDortunities  which  the  present  days  offer,  and 
which  even  our  common  country  schools  now  afford. 
I  never  was  sent  to  any  school.  I  was  always  sick. 
Female  education  in  the  best  families  went  no  further 
than  writing  and  arithmetic  ;  in  some  few  rare  in- 
stances, music  and  dancing." 

The  knowledge  she  possessed  was  gathered  without 
systematic  instruction,  and  her  acquirements  M-ere 
therefore  all  the  more  remarkable.  She  had  great  re- 
]i;:ious  principle,  and  her  training  was  of  that  serious, 


Tamifd  i]y  G  Si\::in 


7.n;^r3ved  jjy  G.?-S;orm._ 


THE   MOTHER   OF   JOHN   QUINCY   ADAMS. 


INTEREST   IN    PUBLIC   AFFAIRS.  639 

l^ractical  nature  whicli  enabled  her  to  meet  all  the 
vicissitudes  of  life  with  equanimity  and  self-compos- 
ure. Her  interest  in  public  affairs  was  surprising, 
and  from  the  time  of  her  marriage  until  her  death  she 
discussed  men  and  measures  with  a  sustained  interest 
and  an  unflagging  zeal.  The  fact  that  her  husband 
was  one  of  the  leading  men  of  his  time,  and  one  of  the 
best  educated  in  the  country,  does  not  of  itself  account 
for  her  attainments  ;  her  mind  was  as  original  and  in- 
tellectual as  her  husband's,  and  she  only  lacked  the 
occasion  to  display  great  qualities  that  lay  dormant. 

When  her  husband  was  away  from  her  she  spent  her 
time  either  in  attending  to  her  business  affairs  or  in  im- 
proving her  mind.  In  one  of  her  letters  to  him, 
written  in  1774,  she  says,  in  regard  to  the  condition  of 
the  country  :  "  The  great  anxiety  I  feel  for  my  coun- 
try, for  you,  and  for  our  family,  renders  the  day 
tedious  and  the  night  unpleasant.  The  rocks  and 
quicksands  appear  upon  every  side.  What  course  you 
can  or  will  take  is  all  wrapj)ed  in  the  bosom  of 
futurity.  Uncertainty  and  expectation  leave  the  mind 
great  scope.  Did  ever  any  kingdom  or  state  regain  its 
liberty,  when  once  it  was  invaded,  without  bloodshed  ? 
I  cannot  think  of  it  without  horror.  Yet  we  are  told 
that  all  the  misfortunes  of  Sparta  were  occasioned  by 
their  too  great  solicitude  for  present  tranquillity,  and 
from  an  excessive  love  of  peace  they  neglected  the 
means  of  making  it  sure  and  lasting.  They  ought  to 
have  reflected,  says  Polybius,  that,  '  as  there  is  noth- 
ing more  desirable  or  advantageous  than  jDeace,  when 
founded  in  justice  and  honor, '  so  there  is  nothing  more 
shameful,  and  at  the  same  time  more  pernicious,  when 


640  ABIGAIL   ADAMS. 

attained  by  bad  measures  and  purchased  at  tlie  price 
of  liberty." 

The  next  year  matters  in  the  struggling  country 
were  not  looking  better,  and  the  clever  woman  was 
watching  the  changes  going  on  about  her  with  anxious 
dread.  She  wishes,  she  says,  that  she  knew  what 
mighty  things  were  fabricating,  and  then  she  philoso- 
phizes on  politics  in  this  wise  : 

"  I  am  more  and  more  convinced  that  man  is  a  dan- 
gerous creature  ;  and  that  j)0wer,  whether  vested  in 
many  or  a  few,  is  ever  grasping,  and  like  the  grave,  cries 
'  Give  !  give  ! '  The  great  fish  swallow  up  the  small ; 
and  he  who  is  most  strenuous  for  the  rights  of  the  peo- 
ple, when  vested  with  power,  is  as  eager  after  the  pre- 
rogatives of  government.  You  tell  me  of  degrees  of 
perfection  to  which  human  nature  is  capable  of  arriv- 
ing, and  I  believe  it,  but  at  the  same  time  lament  that 
our  admiration  should  arise  from  the  scarcity  of  the 
instances. 

"The  building  up  a  great  empire,  which  was  only 
hinted  at  by  my  correspondent,  may  now,  I  suppose, 
be  realized  even  by  the  unbelievers.  Yet  will  not  ten 
thousand  difficulties  arise  in  the  formation  of  it  ?  The 
reins  of  government  have  been  so  long  slackened  that  I 
fear  the  people  will  not  quietly  submit  to  those  re- 
straints wliich  are  necessary  for  the  peace  and  security 
of  the  community.  If  we  sei^arate  from  Britain,  what 
code  of  laws  will  be  established  ?  How  shall  we  be 
governed,  so  as  to  retain  our  liberties  ?  Can  any 
government  be  free  which  is  not  administered  by  gen- 
eral stated  laws  1  Who  shall  frame  these  laws  ?  Who 
will  give  them  force   and  energy  ?    It  is  true,  your 


THREATENS    A   REBELLION.  641 

resolutions,  as  a  body,  have  hitherto  had  the  force  of 
laws,  but  will  they  continue  to  have  ? 
^  "  \Yhen  I  consider  these  things,  and  the  prejudices  of 
people  in  favor  of  ancient  customs  and  regulations,  I 
feel  anxious  for  the  fate  of  our  monarchy,  or  democ- 
racy, or  whatever  is  to  take  place.  I  soon  get  lost  in  a 
labyrinth  of  perplexities  ;  but,  whatever  occurs,  may 
justice  and  righteousness  be  the  stability  of  our  times, 
and  order  arise  out  of  confusion.  Great  difficulties 
may  be  surmounted  by  patience  and  perseverance," 

To  Abigail  Adams  belongs  the  fame  of  having  been 
the  first  advocate  of  woman's  rights  in  this  country. 
In  1774  she  wrote  from  her  home  in  Weymouth,  Mass., 
to  her  husband,  who  at  that  time  was  a  member  of  the 
First  Continental  Congress  in  Philadelphia,  these  ring- 
ing words : 

"  In  the  new  code  of  laws  ...  I  desire  you  would  re- 
member the  ladies,  and  be  more  generous  and  favorable 
to  them  than  your  ancestors.  Do  not  put  such  un- 
limited power  in  the  hands  of  the  husband.  Remem- 
ber, all  men  would  be  tyrants  if  they  could.  If 
particular  care  and  attention  is  not  paid  to  the  ladies, 
we  are  determined  to  foment  a  rebellion,  and  will  not 
hold  ourselves  bound  by  any  laws  in  which  we  have  no 
voice  or  representation." 

The  Constitution  of  the  United  States  was  framed, 
and  women  were  disfranchised.  Tliis,  too,  in  the  face 
of  their  heroic  sacrifices  in  behalf  of  their  country. 

Mrs.  Adams  was  disappointed,  and  wrote  her  hus- 
band : 

"  I  cannot  say  that  I  think  you  are  very  generous  to 
the  ladies,  for  while  you  are  proclaiming  peace  and 


G42  ABIGAIL    ADAMS. 

good-\vill  to  all  men,  emancipating  all  nations,  you 
insist  upon  retaining  absolute  power  over  wives.  But 
vou  must  remember  that  absolute  power,  like  most 
other  things  which  are  very  bad,  is  most  likely  to  be 
broken. ' ' 

Such  were  the  subjects  that  Mrs.  Adams  considered 
as  she  watched  over  her  family  of  five  children  and 
cared  for  her  household.  She  dignified  labor,  and 
often  expressed  regret  that  the  education  of  women 
was  so  trifling,  narrow,  and  contracting.  She  uses  the 
word  "'  female"  for  woman,  which  she  would  not  have 
done  had  she  lived  half  a  century  longer,  but  her 
loyalty  and  friendship  for  her  own  sex  are  strong.  She 
did  not  believe  with  Bartle  Massey,  the  schoolmaster 
in  ' '  Adam  Bede, ' '  that  ' '  women  have  no  head-piece  ; 
it  runs  either  to  fat  or  to  brats."  Her  exj^erience  had 
taught  her  that  what  they  needed  more  than  aught 
else  was  opportunity,  and  she  often  recurs  to  the 
quiet  heroism  of  women  who  made  so  many  sacrifices, 
and  so  uncomplaining,  for  their  country. 

She  herself  was  a  marvellous  example  of  patience. 
Her  husband  went  to  Europe,  to  be  gone  an  indefinite 
time,  taking  their  eldest  son  with  him,  and  later  their 
second  son  joined  his  father.  Her  anxiety  for  this 
son's  safety  was  intense.  The  vessel  in  which  he  sailed 
started  just  before  a  violent  storm,  and  for  four  months 
she  did  not  know  whether  it  had  foundered  at  sea  or 
not.  Months  would  pass  before  she  would  hear  from 
her  husband,  and  there  was  one  period  of  fifteen 
months  when  no  word  reached  her. 

She  was  asked  during  this  season  of  waiting  this 
question  :   "If  you  had  known  that  Mr.  Adams  would 


AT   THE   COURT   OF   ST.   JAMES'S.  643 

have  remained  so  long  abroad,  would  you  have  consent- 
ed that  he  should  have  gone  ?"  and  she  answered,  "  If  I 
had  known,  sir,  that  Mr.  Adams  could  have  effected 
Avhat  he  has  done,  I  would  not  only  have  submitted  to 
the  absence  I  have  endured,  painful  as  it  has  been,  but 
I  would  not  have  opposed  it,  even  though  three  years 
more  should  be  added  to  the  number.  I  feel  a  pleasure 
in  being  able  to  sacrifice  my  selfish  passions  to  the 
general  good,  and  in  imitating  the  example  which  has 
taught  me  to  consider  myself  and  family  bat  as  the 
small  dust  of  the  balance,  when  compared  with  the 
great  community." 

Mrs.  Adams  joined  her  husband  in  England  in  the 
summer  of  1784,  and  spent  the  winter  at  Auteuil, 
France.  She  had  but  slight  acquaintance  with  the 
French  language,  but  so  soon  as  she  was  settled  she 
commenced,  with  the  aid  of  her  dictionary,  to  read 
Racine,  Voltaire,  and  Corneille,  and  soon  was  able  to 
converse  in  it.  Later  she  went  to  England,  her  hus- 
band having  been  appointed  Minister  to  St.  James's. 
She  appeared  at  Court,  and  gave  her  relatives  at  home 
clever  accounts  of  the  scenes  she  witnessed.  But  she 
was  more  interested  in  Mr.  Pitt  and  other  statesmen 
than  in  the  social  events  she  took  part  in.  The  temper 
of  the  English  toward  the  American  minister  and  his 
family  was  not  pleasant.  Aside  from  the  bitterness 
felt  toward  America  as  a  successful  rebellious  prov- 
ince, the  immense  debt  due  from  merchants  in  the 
United  States  to  English  manufacturers  had  soured 
the  latter  beyond  measure,  and  it  greatly  distressed 
thousands.  Many  disagreeable  things  were  borne  by 
Americans  in  England   on   this  account,  and  by  Mr. 


C44  ABIGAIL   ADAMS. 

Adams  and  his  family  particularly  ;  they  accepted  the 
state  of  affairs  as  unfortunate,  and  made  the  best  of 
their  position.  Mrs.  Adams  visited  Holland  and  other 
countries  before  her  return  home,  and  on  arriving  in 
K"ew%York  she  lived  at  Richmond  Hill.  The  seat  of 
government  was  removed  to  Philadelphia,  and  there 
she  established  herself,  as  the  wife  of  the  Vice-Presi- 
dent, in  a  house  called  Bush  Hill.  In  a  letter  to 
her  daughter,  Mrs.  Smith,  she  describes  the  con- 
fusion in  which  she  found  everything  in  her  new 
home.  The  only  grandchild  of  Mrs.  Adams,  the  son 
of  her  daughter,  Mrs.  Smith,  was  with  her  in  Philadel- 
phia, and  she  writes  her  daughter  in  New  York  that 
she  dined  with  President  Washington  in  company  with 
"  the  ministers  and  ladies  of  the  court,"  and  says  "  he 
asked  very  affectionately  after  you  and  the  children, 
and  at  table  picked  the  sugar-plums  from  a  cake,  and 
requested  me  to  take  them  to  Master  John. " 

Her  pen  often  took  a  serious  turn,  and  she  discusses 
the  state  of  the  country,  the  outlook  for  the  future, 
and  public  affairs  generally  with  as  keen  a  relish  as  in 
her  early  married  life. 

In  1800  she  went  to  Washington  as  the  wife  of  the 
second  President  of  the  United  States,  and  took  posses- 
sion of  the  White  House,  then  an  unfinished  and  un- 
comfortable habitation.  The  capital  was  removed 
from  Philadelphia  in  the  early  part  of  that  year,  and 
Congress  convened  there  for  the  first  time  in  the  fol- 
lowing December. 

President  Adams  served  one  term,  and  then  was 
defeated  by  Jefferson,  the  Democratic  candidate.  In 
a  letter  to  her  second  son,  in  speaking  of  his  defeat  she 


VIEWS  ON   WOMAN'S  EDUCATION.  645 

says  :  "  Well,  my  dear  son,  South  Carolina  has  be- 
haved as  your  father  always  said  she  would.  The 
consequence  to  us,  personally,  is  that  we  retire  from 
public  life.  For  myself  and  family  I  have  few  regrets. 
At  my  age,  and  with  my  bodily  infirmities,  I  shall  be 
happier  at  Quincy.  Neither  my  habits  nor  my  educa- 
tion or  inclinations  have  led  me  to  an  expensive  style 
of  living,  so  that  on  that  score  I  have  little  to  mourn 
over.  If  I  did  not  rise  with  dignity,  I  can  at  least  fall 
with  ease,  which  is  the  more  difficult  task." 

The  differences  that  grew  up  between  Adams  and 
Jefferson  had  separated  these  old  and  tried  friends, 
and  the  silence  between  them  might  have  remained  un- 
broken to  the  end  had  not  Mrs.  Adams  written  her 
husband's  political  foe,  on  the  occasion  of  the  death 
of  his  second  daughter,  Mrs.  Eppes,  who  as  a  little 
child  she  had  known  and  had  with  her  in  her  London 
home  for  a  time.  Her  letter  called  forth  a  long  one 
from  President  Jefferson,  and  the  correspondence  was 
continued  through  several  letters.  Mr.  Adams  knew 
nothing  of  his  wife's  letters  at  the  time,  but  later  she 
showed  him  the  correspondence,  which  was  a  credit  to 
her  noble  mind  and  heart. 

Her  views  regarding  woman's  education  she  ex- 
pressed in  a  letter  to  her  sister,  from  which  these  ad- 
mirable sentiments  are  excerpted : 

"  You  know,  my  dear  sister,  if  there  be  bread 
enough,  and  to  spare,  unless  a  prudent  attention  man- 
age the  sufficiency,  the  fruits  of  diligence  will  be  scat- 
tered by  the  hand  of  dissipation.  No  man  ever  pros- 
pered in  the  world  without  the  consent  and  co-opera- 
tion of  his  A\ife.     It  behooves  us,  who  are   parents  or 


Gi6  ABIGAIL   ADAMS. 

grandparents,  to  give  our  daughters  and  granddangli- 
ters,  when  their  education  devolves  upon  us,  such  an 
education  as  shall  qualify  them  for  the  useful  and 
domestic  duties  of  life,  that  they  should  learn  the 
proper  use  and  improvement  of  time,  since  '  time  was 
given  for  use,  not  waste.'  The  finer  accomplishments, 
such  as  music,  dancing  and  painting,  serve  to  set  off 
and  embellish  the  picture  ;  but  the  groundwork  must 
be  formed  of  more  durable  colors. 

"  I  consider  it  an  indispensable  requisite  that  every 
American  wife  should  herself  know  how  to  order  and 
regulate  her  family,  how  to  govern  her  domestics,  and 
train  up  her  children.  For  this  purpose  the  all- wise 
Creator  made  woman  a  heli)meet  for  man,  and  she 
who  fails  in  these  duties  does  not  answer  the  end  of 
her  creation. 

"  '  Life's  cares  are  comforts  ;  such  by  Heaven  designed  ; 
They  that  have  none  must  make  them,  or  be  wretched. 
Cares  are  employments,  and  without  employ 
The  soul  is  on  a  rack,  the  rack  of  rest.' 

''I  have  frequently  said  to  my  friends,  when  they 
have  thought  me  overburdened  with  care,  I  would 
rather  have  too  much  than  too  little.  Life  stagnates 
without  action.     I  could  never  bear  merely  to  vegetate. 

"  '  Waters  stagnate  when  they  cease  to  flow.'  " 

Upon  his  retirement  from  public  life  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Adams  went  to  reside  at  Quincy,  Mass.,  and  there  the 
last  years  of  her  life  were  spent.  She  never  lost  her 
buoyancy  of  spirit,  or  failed  to  be  the  cheerful  com- 
panion she  had  ever  been  to  her  family  circle.     Party 


A  SON'S  TRIBUTE.  647 

spirit,  which  was  intense  during  Mr.  Adams's  presi- 
dential term,  did  not  abate  after  his  defeat  a  second 
time,  and  the  task  of  soothing  his  wonnded  spirit  and 
enlivening  his  leisure  hours  was  her  occui)ation.  She 
had  strong  influence  over  him,  and  from  the  day  of  her 
marriage  until  her  death  her  opinions  had  great  weight 
with  him.  Mrs.  Adams  as  a  wife  was  as  admirable 
as  a  mother,  and  as  a  woman  she  has  had  no  sujDerior 
in  her  own  country.  She  lived  to  see  her  son,  John 
Quincy  Adams,  elevated  to  high  place,  and  died  in  the 
fulness  of  years  and  in  the  perfect  possession  of  all  her 
powers,  in  October,  1818. 

In  his  old  age  this  son  wrote  of  her  as  follows  : 

"  My  mother  was  an  angel  upon  earth.  She  was  a  minister  of 
blessing  to  all  human  beings  within  her  sphere  of  action.  Her  heart 
was  the  abode  of  heavenly  purity.  She  had  no  feelings  but  of  kind- 
ness and  beneficence  ;  yet  her  mind  was  as  firm  as  her  temper  was 
mild  and  gentle.  She  had  known  sorrow,  but  her  sorrow  was  silent. 
.  .  .  She  had  completed  within  less  than  a  month  of  her  seventy- 
fourth  year.  Had  she  lived  to  the  age  of  the  patriarchs,  every  day  of 
her  life  would  have  been  filled  with  clouds  of  goodness  and  of  love. 
.  ,  .  She  had  been  fifty-four  years  the  delight  of  my  father's 
heart.  ...  If  there  is  existence  and  retribution  beyond  the 
grave,  my  mother  is  happy.  But  if  virtue  alone  is  happiness  below, 
never  was  existence  upon  earth  more  blessed  than  hers." 


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